Meadowlark Dental Care Blog

An in-depth look at: Flossing. Is it really necessary? Flossing isn’t fun. It hurts your fingers, it's hard to get it between your back teeth, teeth can be tight together, fillings can cut floss, etc etc. I’ve heard it all. Besides the difficulties sometimes associated with flossing, it takes time, it doesn’t make things feel any cleaner, it can hurt, and the immediate benefit can be difficult to visualize. So, what does it do? Flossing in simple terms disrupts bacteria. It takes a colony of bacteria that’s forming in between your teeth and dismantles it. It removes some plaque from in between your teeth, but mostly it stirs up the bacteria that lives there and destroys their progress. After a dental cleaning your mouth immediately begins the process of building back that plaque and tartar that was just removed. Plaque forms on the surface of the tooth, saliva deposits minerals onto the tooth and, if left long enough, that becomes tartar. Tartar or calculus is a c

Is an electric toothbrush better than a regular bristle brush? This really depends how good you are with your brushing technique, but even someone brushing correctly should notice less plaque with a good electric toothbrush. A Consumer Report published August 28, 2015 states, " Compared with manual toothbrushes, electrics reduced dental plaque 21 percent more and gingivitis (i.e., inflammation of the gums) 11 percent more after three months of use." As far as electric toothbrushes go, I like Philips Sonicare Flexcare and Oral-B Genius. There are lots of comparisons out there for Sonicare verses Oral-B, I don't intend to reinvent the wheel with a new study, but if you would like to look at the differences between each here are some links to reports that have compared them: http://www.bestelectrictoothbrushlab.com/oral-b-vs-sonicare-comparison/ http://www.bestelectrictoothbrushlist.com/ https://www.reviews.com/best-electric-toothbrush/ Note that the fi