Welcome back! We’re so glad you’re joining us again for Part 2 of our dental myth-busting series. In Part 1, we tackled some of the most common dental myths — like whether cavities are really irreversible, if braces are only for crooked teeth, and if knocked-out teeth are truly gone for good. We also touched on if fillings last forever and how to make them last longer with proper care.
Now, in Part 2, we’re diving even deeper into some of the myths that might be affecting your dental health, from the importance of professional cleanings to the truth about wisdom teeth and flossing order.
Dental Myth 5: Teeth Cleaning by a Professional is Not Necessary
So a lot of times we have many patients that come in for cleanings every six months, never have cavities, never have any issues with their teeth, and so they ask us, is it really necessary for us to come see you? My answer is always yes, for twofold. Number one, the most common disease in the whole world is called gingivitis. It’s called inflammation of the gum tissue. Amazingly, 50 to 90% of the population has some form of gingivitis. Now, that may sound scary, but it really just means you have some kind of irritation and inflammation in the gum tissue. And unfortunately as we get older and our manual dexterity goes down, we’re not able to clean our teeth as well. Now we have a greater selection of dental tools to deal with that, whether it’s electric toothbrushes, which are great water picks, water, flossers, it, spray water, and get rid of that debris.
But unfortunately, no matter how good a job you did earlier, as you get older, the ability to clean your teeth doesn’t quite hold up. And so it’s really important to come see us because we can check every six months, make sure your gum tissue’s healthy, make sure we don’t see any developing cracks, problems, radiographs, dental x-rays allow us to see inside the tooth and see the underlying bone structure. And a lot of times with a lot of diseases, and dental diseases are no different. Everything looks fine and feels fine, but if you see something underneath the surface, you can treat it earlier. And I know some of you think you’re doing a really good job, but you may not get all the way in the back, the backside of the very, very last tooth, whether it’s you’re just tired that night or whether you’ve got a gag reflex or whether you just don’t feel like getting back there.
And so when you see us, we inspect every surface of every tooth to make sure nothing’s sneaking up on us. And also at our office, every six months we do an oral cancer screening to make sure that every tissue in your mouth is healthy.
Dental Myth 6: You Have to Floss Before Brushing
Myth number six, you have to floss before brushing. To be honest. To me, the more important things that you’re doing both brushing and flossing, I think if you break it down and look at it, flossing first probably makes more sense because you go in between the teeth, you get to the areas where the toothbrush can’t get to, you dislodge any food particles, any bacteria, any trapped things, and then the toothbrush goes in there, brushes away and cleans everything up. But having said that, if you brush first and then you floss and then you rinse out with the mouth rinse afterwards, you’re clearing that debris at the same time.
I think you probably do the same analogy of do you put milk in the bowl first or cereal in the bowl first? Most people that I know do cereal first and the milk, but if you put the milk first in the cereal, you’re still going to get the same result. So the take home message is, I don’t really care which one you do first, as long as you’re doing both of them.
Dental Myth 7: There’s No Need to Care for Baby Teeth
Myth number seven, there’s no need to care for baby teeth. They’re just going to fall out anyways. While technically that’s true, those teeth should fall out. It’s extremely important to take care of them for a couple of reasons. Number one, if you don’t, you’re actually encouraging infection in the mouth and infection in the mouth can spread to other parts of the body. You can also run the potential of pain, discomfort, and that can impact feeding and chewing.
If you have pain in your mouth, you’re not going to be able to eat the quality foods that you need to. Also, baby teeth, while they aren’t there for long, they do an important role of maintaining space. So each baby tooth has a location that is designed to go into, and it’s designed to hold that space until the permanent tooth can come up underneath it. And so if you don’t protect those baby teeth, a lot of times the permanent teeth don’t know where to come in. And so you’ll get crowded and you’ll get tooth misalignment, you’ll get tooth misplacement. And another thing to kind of establish taking care of those baby teeth, you need to get in the habit of brushing your teeth and taking care of your teeth. And so if you start early, it just becomes something that you know how to do and you’ve done your whole life.
So it’s not so much about the individual baby teeth, it’s more about the baby teeth as a whole and protecting the mouth so when the permanent teeth come in, they’re in the right location and you’re ready to take care of ’em so you can maintain them for the rest of your life. So another question we get is, when should I start taking care of my infant or my baby’s teeth, even when they just have gums? And what I would recommend is even at that young age, start with a washcloth, rub the gums off just to get the baby used to the feel and the touch and the action of kind of cleaning the mouth off. Because at about six months, that first tooth is going to start breaking through. And at that point, I would highly recommend seeing either a pediatric dentist who specializes in baby infant child dentistry, because not only do they have an office and a team set up to handle that, but they’ve got extra training after dental school to really specialize in making sure everything is appearing as it should be and being taken care of properly.
Myth 8: Everybody Has Wisdom Teeth
Myth number eight, everybody has wisdom teeth. So wisdom teeth are technically under the category of vestigial organs. That means that they’re slowly becoming more and more obsolete. So think for example, like the appendix, but in the mouth, wisdom teeth are way in the back. They’re the very third set of molars. They’re actually the most common missing tooth in the mouth because when it comes to function and ability, very rarely do they come in the correct orientation and the correct location for people to use and function and chew with. And so it’s actually very common when you’re in that 14 to 18 range. When healing’s going to be easy, easy access, the tooth has actually formed, and sometimes it’s locked in the bone, sometimes they’ve erupted, sometimes they come in at a weird angle. But that’s the age where we usually recommend we have the wisdom teeth taken out because like I said, recovery will be easier and you don’t really get any function or value out of wisdom teeth.
Now, occasionally there are people with really large mouths that wisdom teeth come in, and my personal philosophy is that if the wisdom teeth come in and there’s room for them to be there, and you can keep ’em clean, I have no problem with wisdom teeth. But the majority of times that’s not the case. The second most common missing tooth is going to be your lateral incisors. So these little baby teeth, and a lot of times people will be missing those, and that opens up a whole nother problem with aesthetics, because at least the advantage of wisdom teeth, when you take ’em out, nobody’s going to miss ’em. And last but not least, myth number nine, you will lose all your teeth eventually when you get old.
Myth 9: You Will Lose All Your Teeth Eventually When You Get Old
Now, that may have been the case maybe 50, a hundred years ago. With the advances with modern dentistry, nutrition, education, home care, a of times, a lot of our patients are keeping all their teeth or the majority of their teeth into their nineties and hundreds.
What If You Do Lose Teeth?
We’ve also got the ability to replace missing teeth now. So even people that are 70, 80, 90, if you’re missing teeth, dental implants are a great option. The most important thing for maintaining your teeth is proper home care and seeing a dental professional to help you maintain that health.
Tooth Loss Isn’t Inevitable Anymore
While it is true that a majority of aging patients are missing some or multiple teeth, the nice thing is the majority of patients we have we’re able to replace those missing teeth and get them back to a quality of life as if they had all their teeth.
So don’t worry that just because you’re getting older means you’re going to lose all your teeth. That’s not the common way anymore. But do know that if things happen, accidents, aging cavities, and you do lose teeth, we’ve got the ability now to restore those missing teeth, whether it’s with implants, bridges, dentures, partials. We’ve got lots of different ways to restore you back to a healthy, functional smile.
Got More Questions? Let Us Know!
So those are nine of the most common myths that we hear and that people ask us questions about. But if you’ve got another myth or you’ve had another question, drop it in the comments below. We’ll start to gather those. We’ll make another myth busting video, if you will, and if you have questions about your own dental care, come see us. We’d love to take care of you. I’m Dr. Brett Langston. I’m here to help you watch your mouth.
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