Everyone knows we all should go to our dentists regularly. If an emergency strikes, of course, immediate help is needed. So when should we go to the dentists? Whenever we have to, that’s for sure! My grandfather was passing on words of wisdom to me when I was around ten years old. Very seriously, he told me to do exactly whatever the dentists told me to do, no matter how odd, or even if what the dentists said to do kept changing. Later, I read about how people say that every tooth in your mouth is a jewel, worth its weight in diamonds to the person whose mouth that tooth is in. I don’t remember him saying that exactly, but I guess that is how it translates. Looking back, this was about the only succinct wisdom he tried to tell us! Other than to use some kind of treatment to comb our hair down…
As an adult, the standard time is usually considered twice a year for cleanings. Some adults with excellent oral health habits and history supposedly are ok to stretch this to once a year. Realistically, it is better to plan for twice a year. Then if rescheduling has to happen, there is time to see the dentist long before a full year has passed. Some patients that have ongoing dental problems are well served with cleanings/checkups as often as quarterly if no other work is being done.
For children, the important part is to get them started in a happy, trusted environment with regularly scheduled visits backed up with regular homework on dental care. Here, it would seem very hard to get children in the proper habit if the visit is only once a year, that’s for sure. If only for the sake of teaching the children to take care of their teeth, maybe even monthly visits/checkups could make sense for a while. According to a pediatric dentist in Woodbridge, VA children also need to go to the dentist as often as needed, depending on what state their teeth are in and what treatments may be ongoing.
Many older adults remember very negative experiences with dentists as a child. Today’s dentistry is very far advanced from those bad old days. These days it seems that most teeth can be saved, even when those older adults fear losing the tooth completely based on the old standard of treatments. And truly painless dentistry is the norm now, not the expensive exception. So, with the right dental practice, there is no longer any good reason to delay scheduling regular visits. In fact, quite the opposite – one fact that backs up Grandpa’s opinion is that dental health is extra important as our teeth are close, and connected, to our brains. Any infection in our teeth has the possibility to easily and quickly affect our mental and physical health.
Many current recent studies have shown a surprising correlation between good dental care and health, and freedom from heart attacks. Surprisingly, this seems to be a pretty consistent finding, which may be both cause and effect = people who are religious about regularly seeing the dentist and getting cleanings are way less likely to suffer heart attacks or other heart disease issues. So it’s time to go to the dentist now for you and your family, come talk to us at children’s dentist Abbotsford today!
