Nasty teeth cleaning

As a dentist, my life is pretty easy. I have a great job, and all my coworkers are amazing people. We are all pretty close and enjoy spending time together outside of work. There have been some very interesting stories to come from us all spending time together as well as in the office. I enjoy doing the regular cleaning. I have some clients who remember me every visit. That is a great feeling because it makes you realize that you are making a positive change in their oral health. As a dentist, I have seen some pretty nasty things due to poor lack of oral health, and I do my best to guide them on how to fix that poor hygiene. Helping the kids is always the best because of their vivid imagination as well as how easy it is to work on their teeth. 

One of the worst visits I had was an older woman, maybe in her fifties. She was telling me that she was having sensitivity in her gums and did not know why. I told her I would happily take a look at it and do the best I could to help relieve her discomfort, but I did tell her to prepare for the worse as it sounds like gum disease. When I got her on the chair and laid her back, I almost jumped out of my skin at the sight of her teeth. They were a yellow practically brown color, and her gums had almost receded all the way up to where they start. 

I began by asking her how often she brushes and if she smokes cigarettes, drinks a lot of coffee, alcohol, or tea. She told me that she did all of the above. I then asked how often she brushes and flosses. Not to my surprise, she responded by telling me she brushes her teeth maybe once a week and has never flossed. I could tell by how much gunk was jammed between her teeth she did not floss. I took a step out of the room to think about how best to clean these near tooth loss teeth. Once I came up with a plan, I went back in to begin attacking these teeth, trying my best to save them. 

I started by doing my best to scrape off all the almost brown plaque and got between her teeth with my tools to get the gunk from there as I knew the floss would not help. After about thirty minutes, things were looking better. Her teeth were more yellow than brown now, so that was a good start. I then grabbed the cleaning drill and began going to town on her teeth. After this was done, her teeth were less yellow. I then applied some fluoride to hopefully protect her teeth. When I was done, we had a heart-to-heart about her oral health. I told her she needed to brush more, at least twice a day. I also told her she needed to get some mouth was since she can not touch her gums without any pain. Finally, I said she needed to get some floss and do that every night. It seemed like she wanted to take my advice.

I have not seen that woman in here again, and it’s been almost a year. I hope that she is well and is taking care of her teeth, as I told her. It would be nice to see her again and see how her teeth are looking if she reverted back to her old habits of not brushing or flossing. I sure hope not.