I want to wash my teeth. What is the procedure for cleaning teeth?

Tooth washing, also known as supragingival scaling, refers to the removal of supragingival dental plaque, plaque and pigment deposited on the tooth surface with scaling instruments, and polishing the tooth surface to delay the redeposition of dental plaque and plaque.

Plaque is the chief culprit of periodontal disease, which will continue to re-form on the tooth surface after removal. Inadequate removal of dental plaque, coupled with the gradual deposition of mineral salts in saliva, will form dental calculus over time. Dental calculus is closely related to periodontal disease, and its main harm comes from plaque accumulated on its surface. Due to the existence of dental calculus, dental plaque is in close contact with the surface of tissue, causing inflammatory reaction of tissue. In addition, the porous structure of dental calculus is easy to absorb a large number of bacterial toxins, and dental calculus will also hinder brushing. If it is not removed for a long time, it may cause gingivitis, periodontitis, bleeding, bad breath, and finally lead to tooth loosening or even falling off. After tartar is formed, it cannot be removed by brushing. According to the different positions of dental calculus deposition, it can be divided into supragingival dental calculus and subgingival dental calculus based on the gingival margin. As the name implies, tooth washing is mainly responsible for removing supragingival calculus, but in practice, shallow subgingival calculus connected with supragingival calculus should also be removed.

In the course of years of use, some pigments will accumulate on teeth, and the sources of these pigments are mainly some foods and colored drinks. Pigment deposition is particularly obvious in people who smoke for a long time and like to drink dark drinks. The presence of pigment will have a certain adverse effect on the appearance of teeth. These pigments should also be removed during gingival scaling. However, because the tooth surface is not as smooth as a mirror, it is impossible to completely remove the pigment, and there will always be some pigment left in the concave part of the tooth surface.

Polishing is a necessary step to clean teeth. After scaling, it is necessary to smooth the tooth surface with a rubber cup and a polishing paste to slow down the adhesion of plaque and the formation of tartar.

The main purpose of tooth cleaning is to prevent and treat oral diseases, not just to look good. The inflammation of gingivitis and periodontitis can be relieved by tooth washing, but periodontitis cannot be cured by tooth washing alone. To cure periodontal disease, further professional treatment should be carried out after tooth washing.

Methods and advantages and disadvantages of tooth cleaning According to the different instruments used, tooth cleaning can be divided into manual scaling and ultrasonic scaling. Manual scaling refers to the use of different types of manual scaling devices, while ultrasonic scaling refers to the use of ultrasonic scaling devices.

Manual scaling The disadvantage of manual scaling is obvious, that is, it is time-consuming and laborious. Usually, it takes about 3 hours to complete the manual scaling of the whole mouth teeth, even for patients with a lot of tartar, it needs to be done several times. During this process, the patient needs to keep his mouth open. Opening your mouth for a long time is undoubtedly uncomfortable for patients, and long-term surgery is even more torture for doctors. Imagine that there is a tractor. Who wants to take an old cow and plow the land in Longmu? Therefore, in clinic, manual scaling is less and less used, and ultrasonic scaling is replaced.

However, manual scaling also has its advantages. For doctors, it feels better to clean their teeth manually, and they can feel the existence of tartar more truly. Manual scaling is soft, and there is no water spray during the operation, so patients will not feel strong discomfort and reduce the chance of clinical cross-infection.

Ultrasonic tooth cleaning The ultrasonic tooth cleaner consists of an ultrasonic generator and a transducer. The generator emits electromagnetic oscillation and amplifies power. The transducer converts high-frequency electric energy into ultrasonic vibration with a vibration frequency of 20,000 to 45,000 Hz. The tartar attached to the tooth surface is removed by the high-frequency oscillation of the working head on the transducer. The working head of ultrasonic dental scaler has many shapes, such as pointed circle and flat shape. The appropriate working head can be selected according to the size and position of dental calculus.

In addition, the ultrasonic dental cleaner is equipped with a water spraying system. When the ultrasonic vibration of the working head is started, the water spraying system sprays water to the working head at the same time to form aerosol, which on the one hand plays the role of cooling the working head, and on the other hand plays the role of forming a cavity, that is, tiny vacuum bubbles in the jetted water droplets quickly burst to generate energy, which washes away dental calculus, dental plaque and the like, and washes away broken dental calculus and blood stains.

The advantage of ultrasonic scaling is that it saves time and effort. Generally speaking, the supragingival scaling of the whole tooth can be completed in about one hour.

After ultrasonic scaling, a probe should be used to carefully check whether there are any missing calculus. If there are some small dental calculus and adjacent dental calculus, they should be cleaned by hand instruments.

In addition, some patients are not suitable for ultrasonic scaling. Patients with infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis, hepatitis B antigen positive, HIV infection, etc. It is forbidden to use ultrasonic dental scaler because the spray it produces will pollute the operating area and the surrounding environment. Patients with respiratory diseases should not use ultrasonic dental scalers, such as patients with respiratory depression and patients with chronic lung diseases. Water spraying and spraying during ultrasonic treatment will bring danger to these patients. Generally, patients wearing pacemakers are forbidden to use ultrasonic dental scalers to avoid interfering with the work of pacemakers and causing arrhythmia and other symptoms.

Disinfection during tooth cleaning usually requires patients to rinse their mouths with disinfectant before starting. This process can effectively reduce the content of bacteria in saliva, thus minimizing pollution.

According to the patient's specific situation, the scaling doctor performs scaling by hand or ultrasound.

The process of washing teeth is usually a little sore. If the gum inflammation is serious, it will bleed when washing teeth. In fact, the amount of bleeding often reflects the degree of inflammation. This situation is similar to bleeding from brushing teeth. You can't brush your teeth or wash your teeth because of bleeding. On the contrary, only careful brushing and tooth washing can eliminate inflammation. After the inflammation is controlled or eliminated, the bleeding will be reduced or disappeared. In addition, due to the existence of a large amount of saliva and water sprayed by the tooth washer, it looks like a large amount of bleeding. In fact, generally speaking, the blood volume will not be too much.

Sand blasting is to further clean teeth with special salt and high-pressure water, and the effect of removing pigment is more obvious. Patients with less severe pigmentation on their teeth may not need sandblasting, but only need to wash their teeth with ultrasound once.

Polishing after washing teeth is like waxing after washing a car. After ultrasonic cleaning, tiny scratches will be left on the tooth surface visible under the microscope, resulting in tiny roughness on the tooth surface and easy accumulation of stains and tartar. Polishing can make teeth brighter and smoother, thus slowing down the adhesion of plaque and pigment and the formation of tartar. In addition, polishing can also reduce dentin hypersensitivity after tooth washing.

Precautions after operation: it is not advisable to eat cold, hot, sour and sweet food within two weeks after tooth washing.

After washing teeth, teeth will be a little sensitive to cold and heat and feel sore. This temporary symptom and the original bleeding usually disappear in a week or so. If the symptoms of soreness persist, you can consider the anti-allergic toothpaste on the market, which will improve after more than one month.

Common misunderstandings 1. I brush my teeth carefully, so I don't need to wash my teeth.

Some people think that if you brush your teeth carefully every day, you don't have to wash your teeth, which is wrong. Due to the rapid formation of plaque, new plaque will be formed within half an hour after thorough cleaning, and the maximum amount can be reached within 30 days. What's more, most people have not mastered the correct method of brushing their teeth. They just clean their teeth according to their own habits. It is inevitable that some parts are not brushed in place, especially between the teeth and the lower incisors, which will become calculus over time. Therefore, if adults have not washed their teeth, they should go to the hospital for tooth cleaning as soon as possible, preferably once every six months.

Second, teeth will turn white after washing.

First of all, we should correct a misunderstanding: some people think that healthy teeth are white, just like the teeth of models in toothpaste advertisements. In fact, this is wrong. The structure of normal teeth is a layer of transparent enamel with yellowish dentin, so it can show some dentin colors, so the color of normal teeth should be slightly yellow. Especially white and opaque teeth usually give people an unreal feeling.

In daily use, some pigments are bound to accumulate on the surface of teeth, which will make the color of teeth look more unsightly. An important goal of tooth washing is to remove these pigments to the greatest extent, so after perfect tooth washing, because these dyed pigments are well removed, the teeth will expose their own color, that is, light yellow.

Generally speaking, teeth will turn white to some extent after washing. However, as a means to prevent and treat periodontal disease, the effect of tooth cleaning on tooth whitening is extremely limited. Patients can improve the appearance of teeth more significantly through other methods, such as cold light whitening and aesthetic restoration.

How often do you wash your teeth?

In developed countries, tooth washing has become a very popular routine oral health care, and people go to the dentist to wash their teeth once or twice a year. After tooth washing, if periodontal disease is found, the dentist will conduct professional oral treatment in time to maintain oral health. Moreover, dentists will make corresponding follow-up plans according to the different conditions of each patient, including the health status of periodontal tissues, oral hygiene, oral cleaning habits, living habits and so on. Some patients have poor periodontal condition and may come to the hospital for reexamination in two or three months, while some patients maintain good oral hygiene and it is ok to wash their teeth once every two or three years.

In short, it is more appropriate for ordinary people to wash their teeth once every six months to one year.

Fourth, tooth washing is harmful to teeth.

Proper tooth washing is harmless to teeth. Normal tooth surface is a layer of enamel with very high hardness, which can completely ignore the influence of tooth washing. The rubber wheel used for polishing is soft and won't wear teeth.

5. Washing your teeth will make your teeth bigger.

This kind of worry makes many people refuse to wash their teeth. In fact, the accumulation of tartar and inflammation of gingiva will lead to local swelling of gingiva. After the tartar is removed, the swelling of gingiva will gradually subside, so the teeth will become obvious. When the tongue licks, the outline of teeth will become more obvious and the teeth will become longer. This is the restoration of the real face of teeth at present, not caused by tooth washing. It's like there will be all kinds of uncomfortable reactions in the process of quitting smoking, but the benefits of quitting smoking are self-evident. Similarly, if you refuse to wash your teeth because you are afraid that your teeth will look bigger, it is extremely unwise to keep your gums inflamed and swollen, which may lead to more serious consequences.

Sixth, tooth washing can lead to dentin hypersensitivity.

Dental calculus is like a thick cotton-padded jacket wrapped around the outer layer of teeth. After cleaning teeth to remove tartar, teeth will be exposed to the long-lost external environment, resulting in all kinds of strange feelings. If it is a healthy tooth, this sensitive symptom usually disappears gradually within one to two weeks after tooth cleaning. When you wash your teeth, you can effectively avoid pain by the following methods:

1. Stage-by-stage tooth washing: For patients with more and thicker calculus, poor anti-inflammatory effect of drugs or poor desensitization treatment, experts suggest that stage-by-stage tooth washing is too hard for such patients, but it is easy for patients to accept stage-by-stage tooth washing, and anti-inflammatory treatment or desensitization treatment can be continued between teeth washing, which can greatly relieve pain.

2, regular tooth washing: calculus accumulated for many years is hard, so it is necessary to increase the intensity of dental scaler to remove teeth, which will aggravate toothache. Therefore, according to the formation of dental calculus and gingivitis, experts believe that regular tooth washing for half a year, one year or two will not cause pain when dental calculus is small and loose, which is easy to remove.

3. Desensitization treatment before tooth washing: The "sore feeling" caused by tooth washing is mainly caused by dentin allergy. According to clinical observation, most people are sensitive to hot, cold, sweet and sour stimuli in their daily lives among people who have severe pain and weakness when washing their teeth. 4- 10 days before tooth cleaning, it is suggested to use toothpaste with desensitization effect to desensitize teeth, which can reduce the feeling of soreness and weakness during tooth cleaning. It can still be used after tooth washing to reduce the pain after tooth washing. [