Prevention is always better than treatment. By actively preventing disease and decay through regular home care, professional dental cleanings and regular exams, you will maintain a healthy, beautiful smile.

In addition, effective prevention can help you avoid costly treatments in the future to remove decay, restore teeth and treat gum disease. Regular prevention is truly your best investment.

Please click on a treatment option for more information:

♦ Professional Cleanings
♦ Dental Examinations
♦ X-Ray
♦ Sealants
♦ Gum Disease

Professional Cleanings

Professional cleanings are performed by a certified dental hygienist at Ainley Family Dental Care to form the foundation for preventing gum disease and tooth decay. In a professional cleaning, your hygienist will:

• Remove plaque from the teeth -- Plaque is a sticky substance that forms in the mouth from food, saliva and bacteria. Plaque sticks to teeth and causes tooth decay and gum disease.
• Remove calculus (tarter) above the gum line -- Calculus is plaque that has hardened on the tooth surface and is difficult to remove. (Calculus below the gum line indicates gum disease and requires a different procedure to remove it.)
• Polish and remove stains from teeth

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Dental Examinations

Dental examinations help to diagnose disease before it becomes hazardous to your health. In addition, regular examinations can save you money by alleviating problems while they are small and before they become expensive to repair, or in some cases, impossible to repair. Your dental examinations generally include the following:

• Oral cancer screening
• Gum disease evaluation
• Saliva culturing detects risk of disease (tooth decay)
• Laser detection and visual examination of tooth decay and fracture
• Examination of diagnostic x-rays to see cysts, tumors, invisible decay and other problems that can't be seen by the naked eye
• Evaluation of status of current restorations (fillings and others)
• Treatment plan for restoration of dental health

We cannot express enough how important it is to see your dentist regularly. Remember, preventing disease is always better than treating disease.

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X-Rays

At Ainley Family Dental Care, we use only digital x-ray technology. Digital dental x-rays or radiographs are very important. They allow the dentist to see things about your oral health that cannot be seen by the naked eye. These items include cysts (sacks of fluid that form on the roots of teeth), cancerous and non-cancerous tumors, invisible decay that occurs between teeth, and the location of teeth that haven't grown all the way in. By using digital radiography to diagnose these problems, we can help save you money in the long run from surgeries or other treatments that might become necessary if we didn't find the problem. In some cases, where dental x-rays show the location of tumorous growths, x-rays can be responsible for saving your life.

Are Dental X-Rays Safe?

Digital dental x-ray equipment is the very safest. We use only state-of-the-art, low radiation machines. By using digital technology, patients are exposed to much lower levels of radiation (80-90% less compared to traditional radiography.) Contrast this minimal exposure with the risk of not finding an illness until it is too late, and you can see why we prescribe regular diagnostic x-rays. Digital technology is safe not only for our patients, but also for our community because there are no chemicals or lead wrapper waste to dispose of into the environment.

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Sealants

Sealants protect the chewing surface of teeth from decay. Normal pits and grooves on the chewing surfaces of back teeth can trap food that can't be removed by brushing or washed out by water or saliva. A sealant is a tough, plastic material designed to bond (stick) to tooth enamel. These clear or tooth colored sealants are painted onto the tooth surface to "seal" the pits and grooves and protect against decay. They are generally applied to children's first permanent back teeth. They can also be useful for adults in certain situations. Advantages of Sealants

Sealants are an excellent way to protect chewing surfaces of teeth from decay. They are a much better financial investment than treating decay after it has started.

Disadvantages of Sealants

Sealants are not permanent. They generally last about five years with normal wear, but can wear off or chip off earlier in certain instances. Also, sealants do not prevent decay between teeth or the onset of gum disease, so regular home care and dental visits are important.

Alternatives to Sealants

There are no appropriate alternatives to sealants. If a tooth has decay, it will need a filling or other restoration.

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Gum Disease

Gum disease (Periodontal Disease) is responsible for about 70 percent of adult tooth loss. It is characterized by swollen, inflamed gums surrounding the teeth. Plaque, a sticky substance that forms in the mouth from food, saliva and bacteria gets inside the space between the gum line and the tooth. If not removed, plaque hardens into a substance called calculus or tarter that is very difficult to remove. Eventually, the bacteria in the plaque and tarter eat away at the fibers that hold the gums to the teeth, creating deep pockets. As bacteria spread, the pockets become deeper until the bacteria finally eat away the bone that holds the tooth in place The bacteria live in the base of the pocket and burrow into the inside wall of the gums. Think of it as if bugs are eating away at the soil around a tree trunk. Eventually, they eat away all of the soil and part of the tree's roots, causing the tree to collapse. Recent medical evidence has shown a link between gum disease, smoking and heart disease.

Recognizing Gum Disease

Gum disease is diagnosed through a process that evaluates the depth and health of the pockets around each tooth.

Pockets that are greater than 3 millimeters in depth and bleed readily when evaluated are considered hazardous to long-term dental health and will generally require advanced treatment. The early detection and prevention of gum disease is another reason to see your dentist regularly.

Treatment of Gum Disease

Gum disease is not treated by a routine prophy or "cleaning." Treatment requires a considerably more comprehensive approach tailor-made to the individual. For patient comfort, anesthesia or "numbing" is achieved in the diseased area. Then the hygienist carefully and thoroughly removes the bacteria and substances that form in the pockets around the teeth. The removal of this material occurs on a microscopic level and requires great skill. Often an antibiotic will be placed directly into the diseased pockets to facilitate healing. Our dental team has state-of-the-art equipment and advanced training to effectively remove all of the bacteria. This process of removing the bacteria usually requires several visits to our office. Once the bacteria has been removed, the pockets must be cleaned and maintained with greater frequency (three to four times per year) by a certified dental hygienist. Otherwise, the bacteria will return.

Long-Term Care for Gum Disease

Keep in mind that once you have contracted periodontal disease, you will always have the disease due to the damage that it does to your body. Careful daily hygiene and a commitment to maintaining frequent dental visits to clean your pockets are required to keep the bacteria from returning. After the initial dental appointments to remove the bacteria and place antibacterial agents, you will be placed on a regular appointment schedule called "periodontal maintenance" to keep your pockets free of bacteria. This is typically four appointments per year. Remember, it is always better to prevent disease than to treat disease.

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