Having great teeth and a lovely smile has never been so important, but there’s no point in shelling out on veneers, gum contours and teeth whitening if you don’t then keep showing up for your check-ups with the dentist in Richmond.
Your twice-yearly check-ups are the foundation of your oral health, and your oral healthy is the foundation of your fabulous smile. So, even if you are saving up for cosmetic dentistry treatments, or have just spent on them, please don’t rest on your laurels and not bother with your check-ups.
Your mouth: in active service 24/7
It’s so easy to forget about your mouth. It’s there to eat, talk and smile, right? Well, yes, it is, but it is also a little ecosystem all of its own, with millions of bacteria living among your teeth, sloshing around in your saliva and making home sweet home around your gum line. Here at Sheen Dental, when we are feeling academic, we call that ecosystem the ‘human oral microbiome’. We are very familiar with its inhabitants, and there may be as many as 6 billion of them living there. That’s not far off the number of people on the planet.
And just like on the planet, this little country in your mouth has good guys and bad guys. The bad guys are intent on decaying your teeth, or giving off acids that inflame your gums.
Streptococcus mutans
This bad boy is the bacterium responsible for causing your teeth to erode. It doesn’t mean to, but it does. It just loves sugar and carbs and every time you eat a donut, or a curry with rice, or a burger and chips, it just goes crazy for those carbs, gorging itself. It goes into a frenzy of reproduction and millions of Streptococcus mutans build up on your teeth in a layer of plaque, giving off acids that eat away at your tooth enamel and your gums. Want to stop it? Don’t feed it sugar. Easy.
You can brush and floss it away, but you also need to come to the dentist in Richmond to deal with the early signs of decay and gum disease. Book a check-up today.