Cleaning

Cleaning and diet are the most important parts of dental prevention. Good cleaning habits can save a great deal of grief over your lifetime. All of us at Pottsville Beach Dental believe prevention is the most important part of dentistry, so we have our brushes, floss and other dental aids priced at cost.

Reasons to clean your teeth

We clean our teeth to remove food debris, plaque bacteria and spent cells from our mouth. Without proper cleaning bacterial populations can built, attacking the teeth and gum tissues.

Cleaning can be broken into proximal (between the teeth cleaning) and aproximal (everywhere else). We need to do both to be effective. There are so many tools out there to clean teeth, but the best ones are those that you can use easily, and will used regularly.

Cleaning between the teeth

If the gaps between the teeth are small, floss is the tool for you. If you find your fingers are too big, there are a variety of multi and single use floss aids on the market. In any case, when flossing

  • pull the floss against the tooth in an up and down motion, not side to side. We want to use the floss to scrape the plaque, not saw through the gums.
  • apply gentle pressure to hold the floss against the tooth, and scrape against the tooth behind, and in front before passing back out and onto the next tooth.
  • If you have not flossed in a while there may be some slight bleeding due to gingivitis, it is important to persist gently

For larger gaps, pixter brushes are very handy. You can think of them as a tiny bottlebrush. They come in a variety of thicknesses and extension handles are available for those of us with stubby little fingers.

  • Choose a pixter size that fills the gap between the teeth but not so big it hurts
  • The cleaning motion is similar to a toothpick, and you can spin it a little to entangle any food debris
  • They might need a little rinse between teeth if they are picking up alot.
  • After you are done, be sure to rinse and dry them, at home it is best to leave the protective cover off to allow the brush to dry.

 

Brushing

Brushing can be used to clean everywhere else, including the top of the tongue. Both electric and manual toothbrushes are effective, but some will find the electric toothbrush much easier.

  • Place the toothbrush at a 45°angle along the gum line. Move the toothbrush in a small circular motion, and repeat for each tooth.
  • Brush the inside surface of each tooth, using the same technique.
  • Brush the chewing surface (top) of each tooth.
  • Use tip of brush to brush behind the front teeth and the very back teeth
  • Be sure to brush your tongue to remove odor causing bacteria.