There are different types of procedures that are carried out by the dentist in the office and each one of these procedure are performed to achieve a specific goal. In some cases, the dental treatments are therapeutic and corrective in nature so they are meant to resolve all kinds of dental issues; but some of the treatment procedures can be preventive in nature, so they are performed in an effort to avoid the onset of oral disease.
Teeth cleaning is an example of a preventive dental procedure. This dental procedure is also known as oral prophylaxis, dental cleaning or dental scaling, and it involves the cleaning of the teeth surface to remove adherent plaque, whether hard or soft.
The following are some information you need to know about teeth cleaning:
Patients are encouraged to visit their dentists twice a year or every six months. During these visits, it is important that they come in for a teeth cleaning. Patients are required to see their dentists twice a year for teeth cleaning; when it is impossible, at least one teeth cleaning a year may be enough. In some cases, a patient may be asked to see the dentist every week, or after three months —- this is applicable for more complicated cases where a patient’s gum condition is compromised.
Your own efforts at home should be beneficial but they can only achieve so much. Collection at the subgingival space is not always accessed and cleaned properly through brushing and flossing. The dentist makes use of scalers that are shaped in such a way so that it can scrape through the deeper areas along the curvatures of the teeth.
The length of time that a teeth cleaning procedure should cover will depend on the oral health condition of the patient.
Ideally routine teeth cleaning procedures should run for about 15 to 30 minutes and that involves scaling through all the teeth in both the upper and lower arches. Sometimes, the dental condition of the patient is more severe, and more thorough scaling is required. For these cases, teeth cleaning may go for as long as an hour or two hours, especially where there is heavy staining.
During a teeth cleaning procedure, the dentist will be scaling through the subgingival space and may touch or sever some fibrous tissue. Bleeding may be present and this should be normal, so do not be alarmed. The condition should normalize after a while, usually as soon as the procedure is completed or a few hours after the appointment.
When normal teeth cleaning is not enough to clean and restore the teeth and gums to health, more invasive procedures may be required. Deep cleaning involves a more invasive access into the subgingival area, where much of the plaque and tartar has collected. When the bone and the roots of the teeth are affected, a surgical intervention involving some gum incision may be necessary so that the dentist can plane the roots. To remove adherent plaque in the root area, the gums will have to be incised so that the infected area can be accessed.
