Why a Regular Dental Check Up is Important
Let’s face it, most of us don’t particularly enjoy going to the dentist but we do so because we know it’s necessary to maintain a healthy smile. Those six-monthly checkups are soon over and done with, and hopefully, that’s it for another six months. Afterward, you have that nice peace of mind that comes from knowing you are looking after your teeth and gums. Most of us tend to think that dental visits are only about your teeth, which is a pretty reasonable assumption, but in fact, your regular dental visits can help you to look after your general health.
Healthy Gums Protect Your General Health
One important part of your regular checkup is a close inspection of your gum health. Your dentist will carefully examine all your gums and may gently probe them using a special instrument. This is because your dentist needs to check that your gums still fit snugly around your teeth and that you do not have any large gaps in between your gums and your teeth.
By carefully probing in between the teeth in your gums, your dentist can measure any gaps that may be developing and which indicate the presence of gum disease. This is a bacterial infection that is normally due to poor oral hygiene and which causes the gums to recede and to pull away from the teeth creating large gaps called periodontal pockets. Normally, healthy gums will have a minimal pocket depth, whereas unhealthy gums will have pockets in excess of 3 mm or more.
Regular checkups help to identify any problem areas in your mouth and allow your dentist to closely monitor your gum health and recommend suitable treatment if they think you are developing gum disease. The good thing about regular checkups is that they help to detect the earliest signs of gum disease, at which point the condition is still curable and the effects are reversible.
Failing to have regular checkups can allow gum disease to progress unchecked until it becomes chronic and the effects are irreversible. You may even lose all your tooth and have to get full mouth dental implants or dentures. Chronic gum disease cannot be completely cured and it can have a negative effect on your general health.
Gum Disease and the Potential Effects on Your General Health
Your mouth contains many different strains of bacteria and not all are benign. Normally, healthy gums prevent these bacteria from going elsewhere in your body, but if you have gum disease then your gums will begin to bleed more easily and those deep periodontal pockets that begin to develop allow bacteria easy access into your body and into your bloodstream.
Since blood is carried all the way around your body, these bacteria have access to just about anywhere. Gum disease is an inflammatory condition and the bacteria causing this inflammation can then go on to create new sites of inflammation.
Gum Disease and Its Links to Other Serious Health Conditions
There have been an extensive number of clinical studies into the connection between gum disease and other serious health conditions. It’s been linked to cardiovascular disease, diabetes, stroke, rheumatoid arthritis, and even some cancers. Pregnant women with advanced gum disease are more at risk of having a preterm baby and a low birth weight baby. It seems to be the inflammatory nature of gum disease that causes the problems, but the exact link isn’t yet known.
Even if these links don’t bother you, you still need healthy gums to have a healthy smile. Your gums protect your teeth and the other structures surrounding them that include ligaments and bone. Advanced gum disease gradually destroys these ligaments and bones, leading to tooth loss.
Did You Know Oral Cancer Screenings Are Included in Your Regular Dental Checkup?
Oral cancer screenings are another vital part of your regular dental checkup. They aren’t necessarily carried out at every checkup, but your dentist will screen you regularly for this condition. Oral cancer can affect the inside of your cheeks, lips, and tongue, as well as the roof and floor of your mouth and the back of your throat. These are all areas that your dentist will check during your oral cancer screening. So what are they looking for?
Common Signs of Oral Cancer
Your dentist is looking for any signs that something is wrong. Common symptoms of oral cancer include changes to the texture of the inside of your mouth, as for example, you may develop a spot that feels slightly different and where the skin becomes rougher or thickened, or you might develop a strange lump or bump for which there is no reasonable explanation. Oral cancer can also cause changes to the color of tissues, creating white or red spots. Another common sign is having an ulcer or spot that doesn’t seem to heal or an area that bleeds easily and without explanation.
You should contact your dentist if you happen to notice any of these symptoms yourself, or if you feel as if something is permanently stuck in your throat, you have difficulty swallowing, or notice changes to the fit of dentures or other appliances. Another symptom is noticing a change in your voice or having a persistent sore throat.
Some dentists carry out a simple visual check and will gently feel inside your mouth and will feel the lymph nodes in your neck, while other dentists may use a special hand-held device. This emits light that causes any suspect tissues to fluoresce in a different way to healthy tissues, making it easy to identify any areas that require closer investigation.
If they do find something wrong, your dentist may choose to take a small sample of cells using a special brush that they will sweep over the area and which will be sent off for further analysis. Another possibility is that they will take a biopsy using a local anesthetic to keep you comfortable.
One of the problems with oral cancer is that early symptoms are often ignored by people who are unaware that they could indicate anything is wrong. This frequently leads to a late diagnosis when treatment is likely to be less successful. If you are ever worried about any changes to the inside of your mouth, you should always seek professional advice. Your dentist is specially trained to detect the early signs of cancer and if they think anything is wrong, they can refer you to a specialist.
