Health care takes many different forms, and a common form of health care is dental care. Nearly everyone has teeth, and the proper care of one’s teeth can ensure a pain-free and fully functional set of 28 teeth. Many Americans take their teeth seriously, as tooth pain can be dreadful and losing one’s teeth makes speech and eating difficult. Therefore, dental care is often at the forefront of people’s minds, and many Americans take themselves o their kids to the dentist. Patients may get anything from a routine cleaning and checkup all the way to wisdom teeth removal, dental implants, a root canal, or braces. How can someone find a good dentist’s office for themselves or their child? And how do some of these dental care procedures work?
Get a Dentist
Many millions of Americans have a regular dentist for themselves and/or their kids, and those who do not are encouraged to find one soon. In fact, dentistry ranks as among the top 10 most trusted and ethical professions in the entire United States, and dentists and their assistants are highly motivated professionals. When a person moved to a new area, or if their child becomes old enough to start getting dental care, a parent can get local references or look online. A parent can find a whole list of local dentists’ offices with an online search such as “dental care near me Los Angeles CA” or “affordable dentists offices Dallas TX”. This may provide a whole lists of dental offices to consider.
The client may then visit some of these offices and evaluate them and the staff in person. A dentist’s office should be within convenient driving or bus distance, and the office should have a welcoming air and be staffed with professionals. Dentists can be consulted to check their credentials and work experience, and they should be able to explain their work and skills in plain language. In the case of finding a dentist for one’s child, the child him or herself should be at ease in the office. A frightened or uncooperative child will mean trouble at a dentist’s office, so a child should be brought along when searching for a dentist’s office for them. Once the right office is found, the parent can start bringing their child there every year or even once every six months.
Common Dental Care
There is more done at the dentist’s office than checkups. Sometimes, tooth extraction may be necessary if a wisdom tooth is coming in. Wisdom teeth are excess teeth that threaten disrupt the healthy formation of 28 adult teeth, so they should be removed when they start growing in. This can be a painless experience, and it will prevent the unhealthy crowding of teeth when the wisdom tooth is allowed to grow in. Tooth extraction may also be done if a tooth is heavily infected, or if the gums are diseased and the tooth is about to fall out anyway.
In other cases, a root canal is necessary. A root canal is not the painful experience some believe it may be, however. A root canal involve numbing the affected tooth, then surgically removing the infected fleshy pulp inside the tooth. This doesn’t even involve the removal of the tooth, although the patient will no longer feel heat or cold in that tooth and it may be slightly more fragile. And sometimes, missing teeth can be replaced with dental implants such as bridges or dentures. Nearly three million Americans have dental implants, and that figure is growing by nearly 500,000 per year. Bridges can be used to replace a single missing tooth with a false one that is anchored to covers that go onto the two flanking teeth. This false tooth looks and functions just like a real one. Or, dentures can replace a whole row of missing teeth, or all the teeth in the mouth. Dentures are most common among elderly patients.
Cosmetics count, too. No one likes having unattractive teeth, such as crooked or discolored front teeth. For this reason, many Americans opt for tooth whitening and straightening to improve their smile. This can be helpful for social prowess, such as a job interview or even dating. Tooth whitening toothpaste is also available, and may prove useful for someone with discolored teeth.
