One common misconception people have about getting new dentures in Long Island is that with the removal of remaining teeth, so is the need for oral care. It’s not hard to see why people would follow this line of thinking. After all, if oral care is primarily about ensuring the health of your teeth, and those teeth are now removed in favor of a synthetic substitute like dentures, then doesn’t mean your oral health requirements are over?
The reality is that the need for good oral care in your life—even brushing—hasn’t actually gone away. It’s just changed. You still need to ensure good “brush maintenance” even with dentures, and here’s why.
Gum Disease Isn’t Going Away
One aspect of getting new dentures in Long Island that isn’t going to change for your oral health is gum disease. You may no longer have to worry about cavities, or root canals, but your gums are still flesh and blood, and still very much vulnerable to infection by gum disease. In fact, without proper denture maintenance, there’s even a higher risk of certain denture-related gum disease!
This means that diligent denture wears should think about brushing just as much—if not more—than people with a full set of teeth. You should be using a soft brush in your mouth, on your tongue, the roof of your mouth, and even the inside of your cheeks to ensure that they stay clean. This is especially true if the type of dentures you’re using also involve an adhesive making prolonged contact with your gums, rather than an implant-style socket system.
You should also be brushing the dentures as well. In this case, however, be careful to get a toothpaste that is specific to denture usage. The reason for this, is because normal toothpaste may contain abrasives that are designed to scour the natural enamel of teeth. Dentures, however, are more delicate in this regard, and scouring agents with abrasives may permanently scratch or damage the dentures, and this damage will only build up and become more visible with time.
Keeping Contaminants Out
The reason you need to brush your dentures—and remove them at the end of the day when you go to bed—is to ensure that plaque and gum disease do not get a foothold on the dentures themselves. Possible contaminants such as food can, if left on dentures, eventually decay, becoming a source of gum disease. If this decay makes prolonged contact with your gums—such as through sleeping without removing dentures—then the chances of a gum disease infection go up considerably.
This is why you still need to brush regularly even once you get new dentures in Long Island. You should gently brush your mouth and you should thoroughly brush your dentures. You can even floss them as well if you like, a task made easier by being able to remove them. Just make sure to undertake these activities over a sink! This way, if you should slip, your dentures have far to fall.
