Remove plaque at home

Plaque deposits are best removed thoroughly from the tooth surface two to three times a day. In addition to the frequency, however, the quality of tooth cleaning also plays a decisive role. It is important that plaque can only be removed mechanically, i.e. by brushing, which shows the importance of brushing the teeth.

Coarse plaque can be easily removed with a toothbrush and some toothpaste. For patients with healthy gums, toothbrushes with medium bristle thickness are particularly suitable for this purpose. When choosing a suitable toothpaste, care should be taken to select a product with the lowest possible proportion of abrasive particles.

Coarse abrasive particles can roughen the tooth substance and thus create artificial dirt niches on which bacteria and other microorganisms can settle particularly easily. In addition to cleaning the tooth surface, great importance must also be attached to the care of the interdental spaces. Especially people with malpositioned teeth or affected gums suffer from plaque accumulation especially in these areas.

For this reason the interdental spaces should be cleaned at least once a day with the help of so-called interdental space brushes. The use of dental floss is also usually sufficient to remove most of the plaque from the interdental spaces.To reduce the speed of plaque formation, various antibacterial mouth rinsing solutions can be used after brushing the teeth. Despite the greatest efforts, some patients are not able to remove all plaque from the tooth surface completely.

Daily oral hygiene can be difficult, especially in the case of malpositioned teeth, very wide spaces between the teeth or pathologically changed gums. A regular appointment in a dental practice can help these patients to prevent the effects of plaque. Most dental offices offer special prophylaxis sessions for this purpose.

These prophylaxis sessions can be performed either by the dentist himself or by trained professionals (prophylaxis assistant; dental assistant; ZMF; dental hygienist; DH). The first step of such a session is the staining of the tooth surfaces to make any plaque remaining on the tooth surface visible. This is followed by instructions for a specific tooth brushing technique tailored to the individual patient.

This is followed by a so-called professional tooth cleaning. In the course of this dental cleaning, the treating dentist or dental assistant cleans all tooth surfaces with the help of a rotating cleaning device. So-called curettes are used directly after the cleaning.

These devices are sterilizable hand instruments that are ground at a specific angle and can be used to completely remove food debris and plaque from the gum line. In addition, plaque (tartar) that sits above and below the gumline can be removed relatively easily. The individual curettes differ in the individual grinding of their ends, which makes it possible to clean a specific tooth surface optimally. Regular professional tooth cleaning can help to prevent the effects of plaque in the long term and keep both the tooth substance and the sensitive gums healthy for a long time.