Dental hygiene treatments are essential for keeping your gums and teeth healthy and your smile bright and fresh.
Who doesn't like that fresh, smooth feeling of their teeth after a dental hygiene visit? At Better Dental we make your teeth and gums sparkling clean and brighten your smile with our gentle stain removal treatments. Your appointment with us is informative and our treatments are super gentle, so you can lean back and relax to your favourite music.
But good oral hygiene is more than getting that fresh mouth feeling. Your oral health and hygiene are tightly connected to your overall health and there are many conditions, like diabetes, heart disease, and inflammatory diseases that interplay with how healthy and clean you keep your mouth. Dental hygiene therapy is not just cosmetic — it can improve your overall health significantly. So, please don't neglect it!
At Better Dental, we don't just perform scales and cleans and then send you on your way. We thoroughly review all aspects of your oral hygiene and critique your brushing and flossing techniques. We also help you to navigate the vast amount of dental products and select the right toothpaste, toothbrush, and other hygiene tools for your particular needs and show you how to use them most effectively. At the end of the appointment, you will be given a free starter pack, so you can put these new tools and techniques into practise straight away!
During your hygiene appointment at Better Dental we typically:
Review your medical and dental health history
Review any medications you are taking
Review lifestyle changes or habits and their impact on your dental health
Review your diet
Conduct a decay risk analysis
Analyse oral hygiene by measuring plaque levels and location
Provide oral health instructions and training
Perform a gum health screening
Gently remove hard (tartar) and soft deposits (plaque)
Remove staining and polish teeth
Perform remineralisation treatments
Take high resolution imagery of areas to monitor (if needed)
If you have a history of periodontitis (gum disease involving bone loss), we will also place you on a periodontal maintenance program, which will also include:
Yearly detailed analysis of all your gums
Reassessment of periodontal pocket activity and treat any active pockets
Reassessment and mitigation of periodontal risk factors
Let us help answer the most common questions you might have.
When plaque builds up between and on your teeth it can mineralise and harden, forming what is known as "calculus". Due to its hardened structure, calculus requires specialised tools to remove it. If you try to remove it by yourself, you run the risk of damaging your teeth and gums. This is because the bristles of a toothbrush are too soft to be effective, and anything more abrasive is likely to scratch away healthy enamel and cause permanent damage to your teeth.
Calculus can also build up deposits under your gums, causing irritation and, if left untreated, can lead to serious gum disease. Without the proper tools and techniques, you cannot safely remove the calculus from under your gum line. This is why it is so important to see our oral health therapist, so we can keep your gums healthy and either cure or manage any underlying disease.
The treatment time for most hygiene appointments is around 45-60 minutes.
Our oral therapist is highly trained at providing gentle care. With her up to date knowledge and our modern treatment techniques, we remove plaque, tartar and stains without damaging your teeth and gums and our treatments are for the large majority pain-free and comfortable. You may have some teeth with exposed roots that can react to air and water, but we are very mindful of these areas and are extra careful there to keep you comfortable at all times.
If you have not had a hygiene appointment in a long while, or you have particularly hard and deep build-ups on your teeth and under your gums, the clean may be sensitive in some parts where we have to work extra hard to clean these areas. However, if this is the case we will let you know beforehand and can numb you up with cream (no injections), with local anaesthetic, or relax you laughing gas which also has mild numbing properties. If you feel nervous about having a hygiene appointment, please give us a call and we happily discuss options with you on how we can ensure your comfort.
Fluoride strengthens the teeth and has been clinically proven to lower decay rates significantly. It strengthens exposed roots and helps combat sensitivity. It also makes tooth structure more resistant to attacks from acids from food and drinks and bacterial plaque.
Fluoride can also reverse early decay and heal it. Professionally applied fluoride is a lot stronger than what you can get in a toothpaste and our dentist and oral therapist selects the right fluoride treatment for keeping your teeth healthier and stronger.
Fluoride is perfectly safe and healthy to use in the recommended doses and is a fantastic way of preventing decay in all ages.
Only in extremely high doses can it be toxic, but this is true for all substances, including water. Fluoride is found in foods, natural water sources, community fluoridated water, and toothpastes.
For most people, we recommend they have a oral hygiene treatment every 6 months. However, some people will require more frequent appointments, especially when periodontal disease is present and being managed. In such cases, we may suggest that you have treatment every 3-4 months to keep your gums in tip-top shape.
Keep your teeth clean and plaque-free.
It's the best way to prevent dental problems.
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