Water flosser vs traditional dental floss
Which option is the best for your oral health
It’s second nature for us all to brush our teeth twice a day but many will skip the crucial step of flossing. When exploring the task of flossing, one may wonder if water flossing is a better solution. Here we go into the pros and cons for each.
Which option is the best for your oral health
It’s second nature for us all to brush our teeth twice a day but many will skip the crucial step of flossing. When exploring the task of flossing, one may wonder if water flossing is a better solution. Here we go into the pros and cons for each.
What is a water flosser?
Water flossers are electrically charged and use water pressure to get in between your teeth and dislodge the plaque hidden there. They are designed to make flossing a bit easier and are excellent for people who wear braces as they can get into those tough spaces that are more difficult for toothbrushes.
How do you use a water flosser?
There are a few steps to follow if you want to get the most out of your water flosser:
Use warm water when filling the tank of your water flosser
Place the tip in your mouth and lean over the sink before turning on or use your water flosser in the shower to avoid creating a wet mess all over your bathroom
Hold at a 90-degree angle in your mouth. Once turned on, the water will push out in pulsing flows to encourage the movement of build-up between the teeth.
Start cleaning your back teeth first and work your way forward with the most emphasis on the gum line as this is where food particles settle. Start at the back teeth and work your way throughout your mouth.
Don’t ignore the backs of your teeth.
Spend at least two minutes using your water flosser and once completed thoroughly empty excess water from the tube to avoid the growth of bacteria.
An important note is that a water flosser should only be used in conjunction with brushing your teeth – it’s in no way a replacement for this.
What are the benefits of a water flosser?
For those with sensitive gums where traditional dental floss may cause pain
Cleaning around braces – particularly after eating
Cleaning crown bridges or any dental implants, particularly when they’re new.
Keeping temporary fillings clean when going through a root canal
Is a water flosser better than traditional dental floss?
This really depends on what you’re using a water flosser for. Traditional floss will also be the chosen method when it comes to daily oral health practices. It's proven to be the most effective way of preventing gingivitis and other gum disease if done correctly and is crucial to reach under the gum line where a toothbrush and water flosser will have difficulty.
Whilst a water flosser may seem like an easier solution, it should only be used when traditional flossing proves to be painful or overly difficult.
If you love the freshly cleaned feeling a water flosser can give, then simply use this with traditional dental floss.
Emergency Dentist Sydney Says
Speak to Emergency Dentist Sydney if you’re on the fence about which option to go with.
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Can Toothache Be Prevented?
How to Avoid Toothaches by Protecting Your Oral Health
How to Avoid Toothaches by Protecting Your Oral Health
Toothaches are fairly common but also extremely unpleasant. There are a number of problems that can cause toothaches including infection and abscesses. However, the most common cause is tooth decay. When this occurs, it means you will have to make an expensive trip to the dentist for a filling. Fortunately, it’s also fairly easy to avoid this kind of toothache. You just need to take better care of your oral health with the following steps.
1. Regular Brushing
You should brush your teeth at least twice a day for at least 2-3 minutes if you want to avoid emergency trips to the dentist with a toothache. And don’t guess at the timing either, make sure you take a watch with you, at least while you’re getting used to your new habit.
2. Floss Every Day
Brushing is good but it can’t get rid of the small particles of food that get stuck between your teeth. Flossing at least once a day will help you avoid the build-up of food and bacteria between your teeth that causes cavities.
3. Avoid Sugar and Sticky Foods
The bacteria in your mouth need sugars to survive and multiply. This means that your diet is incredibly important in determining the health of your teeth. Try to avoid sugary foods like soft drink and juice. You should also cut down on the amount of sticky foods you eat because they can easily become stuck to and between your teeth. This means cutting down on candy and caramels, or at least brushing and flossing well when you do eat them.
4. Eat Vegetables
If you want healthy teeth and a healthy body you need to eat lots of raw, healthy vegetables. Vegetables are packed with essential vitamins and nutrients and they also contain lots of water, which can help to clean the bacteria from your teeth.
5. Drink Lots of Water
Water is essential for every system in your body and that applies to your teeth as well. Drinking water helps to wash bacteria away from your teeth and it also encourages saliva production, which protects your teeth in between brushing.
6. Have Regular Check-Ups
If you want to keep your mouth healthy, you need to visit your dentist twice a year for a check-up. Your dentist will be able to see signs of problems early, which is key to quick and easy treatments. This will help you avoid late night visits to your after hours dentist. Your dentist will also give your teeth a complete and thorough cleaning, which will improve your overall oral health.
Emergency Dentist Sydney Says:
If you have a toothache after office hours, make sure you contact our Emergency Dentist in Sydney. Our caring and expert staff are available now to take care of all your emergency dental needs.
Easy Ways To Improve Your Dental Health in 2018
Avoid Needing Emergency Dental Care
Avoid Needing Emergency Dental Care
Most of us make resolutions for each new year and chances are at least a few of them are still in effect right now. Sticking to those promises you have made to yourself can be tough, but not impossible if you are serious about them. Take a resolution to keep your teeth healthier for example. Sticking to that need not be hard at all, especially if you follow these basic tips...
Cut Back the Sugar, For Real This Time
Yes, we sound like a broken record on this issue sometimes, but we're OK with that as it is such an important piece of advice for the good of your teeth and gums. And the good of your body overall.
Unlike calcium, or proteins, or even carbohydrates, no-one's body actually needs sugar, we just really like it. It's also very hard to avoid sometimes as it is included in all kinds of processed foods that you'd usually consider savory. But it's terrible for your teeth and pretty bad for your body overall as well.
If you can't imagine life without the occasional sweet treat we do understand; neither can we. But make it just that, occasional, and get into the habit of checking food labels when shopping for added extra sugars that could be avoided by making a different choice.
Commit to Flossing Daily
In case you are questioning if we even need to floss anymore, check out our myth busting article 'The Great Flossgate Debate'. With that out of the way, we know flossing can seem annoying but it doesn't taken that long once you get the hang of it.
To make it easier to do, consider investing in some purse and wallet friendly pre-made flossers from the chemists or, if you want to push the boat out a bit further (and are a bit of a tech head anyway) you can pick up an electric flosser for around $50 from your chemist or dentist.
Learn to Love Your Dentist
Very few people will tell you that a visit to the dentist is at the top of their list of favourite pastimes. But it really isn't as scary, or as much of a hassle, as you think. Modern dentistry focuses around providing great oral care with a minimum of pain and as little fuss and extra expense as possible.
In addition to a six-month regular checkup you could consider making this the year you invest in your smile in a bigger way, whether that means a few whitening treatments or a bit of cosmetic dentistry that makes a bigger difference.
Emergency Dentist Sydney Says:
Resolving to take better care of your teeth in 2018 is a great idea to maintain or improve your oral and general health and to avoid unnecessary dental expenses, such as emergency dentistry. If you are looking for dental advice or considering cosmetic dental treatment, get in touch with us today.
Dental Flossing 101
Yes It's a Bother, But You Still Need to Do It...
Yes It's a Bother, But You Still Need to Do It
Flossing has, to be fair, been a topic of much discussion and even a little controversy over the last year or so, but, as we have explained before, it really is still a must. And, we'll admit, sometimes the most annoying and challenging part of a good oral health routine. It's a fiddly procedure that many of us get annoyed with and even get it more than a bit wrong sometimes. However, flossing the right way is not really as hard as it might seem, all you need to know are the basics of the best way to do it. Not really sure what those are? Read on to find out.
A Step by Step Guide to the Proper Way to Floss
After brushing your teeth take around 18 inches of dental floss and wrap the majority of it around your middle finger.
Next, wrap the remaining loose floss around the opposite finger, leaving enough floss between them to rub between your teeth comfortably.
Holding it tight between thumbs and forefingers, insert the floss between your teeth using a careful seesaw motion. Don't do so too quickly as you may injure the sensitive gum tissue around your teeth if you do.
Once the dental floss is between your teeth curve it into a rough 'c' shape around one of them and rub up and down gently, ensuring that you keep the floss pressed against the tooth. Again, go slow to avoid injury.
Reverse the 'c' to clean the other side of the tooth, repeat the process and then gently remove the floss from your teeth.
Clean all of your teeth in this manner, using fresh floss as necessary. Pay special attention to your back teeth, as this is where a great many instances of gum disease and tooth decay begin, as the tartar and plaque buildup there is much harder to see with the naked eye.
As we mentioned, some people get pretty desperate when they are stuck with a toothache that just won't quit. Two aspirins didn't work, so they take four. Four don't work either so they take four more. That, however, is a terrible idea. The correct dosage of an anti-inflammatory OTC pain reliever might provide some relief - hopefully it does - but if it doesn't, taking so many more that you start to rattle a bit is not going to help.
It also won't help to try to booze away the pain. Well, it might for a little while, if you drink enough, but within a couple of hours you'll have a banging hangover AND a terrible toothache to contend with and, if you were also popping Advil, you could seriously have damaged your health.
Then there are those weird home remedies that Google's thrown up for you. A few temporary pain killing home remedies do work (more about that in a moment) but most are nonsense. Some suggest gobbling garlic over a visit to a dentist asap, but unless you are also dealing with a vampire infestation or something, that really won't help. And don't even think about trying something daft like pulling your own tooth, whatever Grandpa might say.
Alternatives to Standard Floss - Are They Any Good?
Standard dental floss - which is basically just specially coated string - is pretty cheap and easy to find in the shops. However, since, even when they do understand the right way to use it some people skip flossing because it's too time consuming a number of products have been launched in an attempt to make flossing easier. But are they actually any good?
One inexpensive alternative to standard floss in a box are floss sticks, or floss picks as they are also known. Lots of people do prefer these to standard floss as a lot of the measuring and guesswork is taken out of the equation and although you can only really use each pick once for hygiene reasons, making it a bit pricier to use them, the potential oral health benefits of actually flossing make the investment worth it.
There are also several different kinds of 'mechanical flossers' on the market. Some make use of water, some make use of air and they are priced anywhere between $10 and about $75, depending on the model you choose. Some do work well, and a water flosser can be an especially good choice for those with braces or bridges, as they can remove food particles that brushes and flosses often miss. Should you make the larger investment in one of these gadgets? If you struggle to floss now but think they might change that, by all means go ahead.
Emergency Dentist Sydney Says:
The bottom line is, however you floss, you still need to do so and there's no getting out of it if you want to maintain truly healthy teeth!
The Great Flossgate Debate
We take a look at the ongoing debate over flossing and if you should still be flossing away each day...
What's The Real Deal?
Dental floss. Chances are that you have some in your bathroom right now. And we wouldn't be too surprised if you've been wondering recently if it still actually belongs there. Over the last year or so dental floss - and the act of flossing at all - has become the subject of some rather heated debate worldwide, after an Associated Press 'investigation' published in 2016 suggested that the oral health benefits of flossing have been overblown. As you might expect, dentists across the globe for the most part disagreed. But what's the real story?
A Brief History of Dental Floss
If we are going to talk about dental floss and its real role in oral health it helps to know a bit about how it ever came to be in the first place. Although there is some evidence that even cave dwellers used rudimentary toothpicks, the concept of dental floss did not appear until the early 19th century courtesy of a scholarly dentist practicing in New Orleans in the US.
Levi Spear Parmly was not exactly your average dentist. He was a rather serious man who loved research as much as he did dentistry, becoming a noted author in the field at a relatively young age. It was in 1819 that he first wrote about his practice of making use of waxed silk threads to clean between his patient's teeth. He laid out his rationale for doing so by stating it was "to dislodge that irritating matter which no brush can remove and which is the real source of disease".
Dental floss was not made commercially available however until long after Parmly's death. In 1882 the Codman and Shurtleft company began producing unwaxed silk floss for general sale, but the concept didn't begin to really catch on until the Johnson & Johnson Corporation received a patent for dental floss made from the same silk thread that surgeons used for stitches.
Finally, dental floss as we know it came about during World War II, when a New Orleans doctor, Charles C. Bass, a man who had a great interest in how oral health affected general health, revisited Parmly's original concept of waxing the flossing thread, but he used nylon instead of silk, partially because it was cheaper and easier to work with than silk and partially because of its superior abrasion resistance.
Ask any dental student and they'll tell you that both Parmly and Bass are considered true pioneers in the field of preventative dentistry and that their work still influences the profession today. So, did two brilliant minds, working over half a decade apart, really get it all wrong?
Vintage advertising from Lister, above left and Crest, above right.
Dental Floss and THAT Report
Coming back to the 'Flossgate' debate (yes, people have called it that) of today, most dental educators dentists had similar responses to the AP report. The report, they said, missed the point completely when it comes the benefits of flossing for oral health.
Per many of them the research used as the basis for the piece did indeed show that yes, when flossing is performed incorrectly, there are no health benefits. But why would that come as a surprise to anybody they countered. In addition, the very same studies showed numerous benefits could be associated with flossing with proper technique. So, essentially, the "big" news was no news, simply a reiteration of what dentists had been saying all along, floss regularly and floss the RIGHT WAY and your oral health will be improved.
Let us not forget people who suffer from gum disease and other health problems resulting from less then sufficient oral hygiene habits. Patients with poor oral hygiene habits, poor diet and/or poor lifestyle habits may have early signs of oral disease or infection. Inheritance plays a massive role in periodontitis as well with genetics being a contributing factor in the onset of the disease.
Incorrect brushing techniques, regular smoking or a diet high in sugar may result in gum disease, which can be irreversible once the disease advances to periodontal disease. This may be even moreso for patients gentically predisposed to gum disease. For patients engaging in habits that lead to gum disease, they are often unaware of the physical signs and symptoms. For these patients regular flossing is imperative.
The Emergency Dentist Says:
Not everyone bought the arguments against the report and for some, the debate over flossing is still going on. However we side with majority of our peers and recommend regular flossing. Think you might need some help with your flossing technique? Make an appointment for a checkup (you know it's time anyway) and we'll be happy to give you a lesson.
Oral Health Tip #02 – Flossing
Flossing your teeth effectively is important to making your daily oral health routine count. Take a look at our How To refresher on good flossing habits...
Floss once a day
Flossing your teeth effectively is important to making your daily oral health routine count. Take a look at our How To refresher on good flossing habits
When should I floss my teeth?
Simple rule, before you go to sleep.
After you've had dinner, or any late night snacks, make it an automatic ritual to brush and floss. #HotTip If you're starting out as a newbie and you haven't been a regular flosser in the past, try flossing your top teeth one night then your bottom teeth the next. You can alternate between the top and the bottom each night until you get used to it and get a bit faster. This is especially time consuming for people with braces too!
How do I floss correctly?
Start with 'the grab'. Technique: Wrap a long strand around your middle fingers (they're the rude ones), leaving your forefingers free.
Brace position. Technique: Hold the floss between your thumbs and forefingers in both hands.
Start on the Top. Floss the top teeth between each tooth and partly up between the gums and teeth, don't force it too much. Technique: Use your fingers to pull the floss back and forth, working your way from between the teeth to between the teeth and gums in a 'Y' shape.
Repeat step 3.
Do I brush first or floss?
We say, floss first. Everyone has a different opinion on this, we take a practical approach.
When you floss you are cleaning in between your teeth and, in most cases, you are moving particles of food from between your teeth to the inside of your mouth or the surfaces of your teeth. We therefore would recommend brushing after doing this. We like to compare it to cleaning under your nails vs washing your hands. Most people would want to wash their hands after removing dirt or other nasty things from under their finger nails. That's our theory.
But there is no concrete evidence to support either order of brushing vs flossing. As long as you are disrupting the happy lives of bacteria who build little communities and multiply on and in between your teeth, you are doing the right thing.
If you do prefer to brush before flossing, we recommend thoroughly rinsing after flossing.
The #EmergencyDentist Says:
Best practice is a nightly floss after dinner – It doesn't really matter if your brush before or after you floss
Dental Care 101: Prevention Tip
Let's get started with a few dental hygiene prevention tips...
Prevention Is Your Best Friend: Here's Our TOP 10 List
Every person's smile is unique and so is their dental care requirements. However, there a few things we can all do, from a young age, to ensure we keep the teeth we have and keep them healthy. Let's get started with a few dental hygiene prevention tips:
Our top tips:
Brush Regular!It's simple but lots of us don't do this most simplest of activities. So, brush twice a day, after meals where possible.
Floss Regular. Twice a day to be exact! A slow sawing motion is the best way to do it. If you're not sure how to do it ask your Dentist at your next visit. If you are a regular 'flosser' you should check your technique at your next check-up, just in case. For detailed info on how to floss right check out our flossing tips page (link to come).
Choose The Right Toothbrush For You. The toothbrush you choose should have a head small enough so that you can reach behind your back teeth. The bristles should also be soft, these will be kinder to your gums long term.
Right. The average adult should brush their teeth for about 3 minutes and combine a technique of up and down on teeth surfaces and soft circular motion where your teeth meet your gums. Anything shorter and you're probably not paying enough attention to where and how you're brushing. If you brush longer than 3 minutes you may be causing gum or plaque damage, so keep it close to 3 minutes. For detailed instructions on how to brush right check out our brushing tips page (link to come).
Limit Acidic Foods & Drinks. These include things like soft drink or fizzie drinks, cordials and fruit juices. The acidic levels in these manufactured foods and drinks are concentrated and above the desired standard levels. They will dissolve the minerals contained in the enamel that coats and protects your teeth, leading to cavities (holes).
Limit Sugary Foods. These include things like lollies and candies, sweeteners, dried fruits, cakes, jams, some cereals and sauces. The bacteria in dental plaque change sugars in to acids and we all know what that does.
Protect Teeth From Injury. Always wear a mouthguard or full-face helmet when playing any contact sports.
Save Dislodged Teeth. Should your teeth be knocked out while playing sport or in an altercation or accident, seek medical advice immediately. Once you have done this you should wrap the tooth in plastic or place it in a container of milk until you are able to seek medical advice.
Use Your Teeth To Chew! Doing things like cracking nuts, opening bottles by popping off the lid with your teeth, or sucking on a hard boiled lollies or candies can crack or chip your teeth. These may not be evident or noticeable at the time they occur but will develop in to bigger problems with time.
Use A Fluoridated Toothpaste. Fluoride hardens your tooth enamel and helps greatly to reduce the risk of tooth decay.
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