What to Expect During and After Your Root Canal
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The Importance of Professional Teeth Cleaning
Everyone loves a bright, warm smile. It's often the first thing people notice about you, and it significantly influences your first impression of others.
Maintaining that picture-perfect smile requires more than just brushing and flossing daily. Getting your teeth professionally cleaned regularly is also crucial.
Beyond maintaining your beautiful smile, professional teeth cleaning is vital in preventing dental diseases and ensuring overall oral health.
Here at Livwell Dentistry in San Francisco and San Ramon, California, Dr. Wenli Loo and Dr. Steve Deng have seen firsthand the transformation that professional dental cleaning brings to our patients’ oral health and confidence.
In this article, we break down why professional teeth cleaning is vital and what to expect from the process.
Why is professional teeth cleaning important?
Brushing and flossing daily are crucial to dental hygiene, but they don't catch everything. Plaque and tartar can still build up in hard-to-reach areas, leading to tooth decay, gum disease, and even tooth loss.
Professional teeth cleanings eliminate these buildups, reaching the areas that typical at-home routines can't. During these cleanings, we can also spot early signs of problems, such as broken fillings and fractures.
Benefits of professional teeth cleaning
Getting your teeth cleaned at the dentist has several benefits, including:
- Prevents cavities and gum disease: Plaque buildup is the leading cause of tooth decay. The acid produced by plaque erodes the tooth enamel, creating cavities. Regular cleanings can effectively remove this plaque, preventing cavities and gum disease.
- Brightens your smile: Over time, coffee, tea, wine, and tobacco can stain your teeth. Professional teeth cleaning can remove built-up stains and leave your teeth freshly polished.
- Freshens your breath: Good oral hygiene is the best way to prevent persistent bad breath, medically known as halitosis. Even with regular brushing and flossing, certain areas may be difficult to clean thoroughly, allowing food particles and bacteria to linger.
- Saves money in the long run: By investing in regular professional teeth cleanings, you're essentially investing in preventive healthcare. Catching oral health issues early, when they're typically more manageable and treatable, can help you save significantly on more expensive, extensive treatments in the future.
- Boosts overall health: Research has shown that dental health can impact overall health. Regular teeth cleanings may lower your risk for diseases like heart disease and stroke, as many of these medical conditions are linked to oral health.
The benefits of professional teeth cleaning extend far beyond an attractive smile. Good oral health helps boost your self-confidence, enhances your overall well-being, and contributes to a happier, healthier life.
What to expect from the teeth cleaning process
The process typically begins with a physical exam of your mouth. We use a small mirror to check around your teeth and gums for signs of gingivitis or other potential concerns.
If we don't identify any significant problems, we remove plaque and tartar around the gum line and between your teeth. This process, called scaling, may tickle a bit but shouldn't cause discomfort.
After scaling, we clean your teeth with professional-grade toothpaste via a high-powered electric toothbrush. This brushing and expert flossing ensures every nook and cranny of your mouth is clean.
We usually wrap up with a fluoride treatment to protect your teeth and fend off cavities.
Deep cleaning
When there's a significant build-up of tartar and bacteria under your gum line, a standard cleaning won't suffice. That's when we recommend a deep cleaning procedure known as scaling and root planing.
This process not only removes tartar from above and below the gumline but also smooths out rough spots on the root of the tooth where germs gather, helping prevent further buildup and infection.
Professional teeth cleaning is a must when it comes to preserving your oral health and your gorgeous smile.
At LivWell Dentistry, our professional teeth cleaning services will keep your smile bright, healthy, and confident. Schedule your cleaning online today, or call 415-477-3700.
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