Dentures, Implants, And Oral Care
Flossing helps remove plaque and food particles that get stuck between your teeth. It’s an important part of your daily tooth-cleaning ritual, and it’s equally important to use good technique and really dig into the gaps where your teeth meet your gums. But should that ritual change when some of your teeth are missing? And in what ways?
Dental Implants
Dental implants are replacements for teeth that involve putting a titanium screw in your jawbone and then attaching a porcelain crown to the titanium. The bacteria that live in your mouth can dissolve enamel but they can’t dissolve porcelain, so there’s no chance of getting a cavity in a dental implant.
However, while the implant itself will be fine, the gums around and underneath the implant are still alive and can still get infected. Porcelain teeth can also become stained if you don’t take care of them. That’s why dentists everywhere recommend that you keep up your brushing and flossing routine as if your dental implants were real teeth. Doing so will keep your gums healthy and avoid problems like gingivitis, periodontitis, and infections in the hard-to-reach space underneath the false crown.
Dentures
Dentures are much cheaper than implants, but they also aren’t complete replacements for teeth and need to come out every night. Standard denture care includes soaking them in a cleaning fluid every night, but it’s also important to brush them every day to scrape off the bacteria that build up. Brushing dentures is easier than brushing your teeth since you can pull them out and look at them, but you still may need to floss them sometimes to get at the bacteria and food that gets stuck between the artificial teeth.
Don’t forget about your gums, or your remaining teeth, either. Brushing gets bacteria off your gums, too, plus the rubbing helps toughen up the tissue. You might not have to worry about cavities with your dentures, but too much bacteria can still lead to infections and make your breath smell.
False teeth, whether they’re the kind you can remove or not, still spend time in your mouth and so you still need to clean them just like how you clean your teeth. You might not have to worry about cavities, plaque, or tartar, at least not as far as the false teeth go, but too much bacteria spending too much time in your mouth is still a problem and both brushing and flossing are still the solutions.