Dental Cleanings

Our dental team is happy to assist you in achieving a cleaner, healthier smile free of harmful plaque buildup or decay. We encourage you to visit us for regular cleanings and exams in Hillsborough, North Carolina, so you can keep your smile in good condition. If you would like to learn more about the benefits of regular dental cleanings here at Providence Smiles, please give us a call today at 919-732-8179 and set up a visit with our dentist, Dr. Kwame Gyampo.

Regular Cleanings and Exams

Providing regular dental cleanings and exams at our office is the simplest way our team can help our patients maintain healthy smiles. During each dental check-up, we will thoroughly clean your teeth and examine your whole mouth for any potential conditions that may threaten your oral health. When you visit our office for you dental cleaning and exam, you can expect the following:

• We will provide a professional teeth cleaning designed to remove any plaque, tartar or dental calculus which may cause tooth decay or periodontal disease.
• One of our hygienists will floss and polish your smile for a bright, finished look.
• Our dentist will examine your whole mouth for signs of potentially dangerous conditions or diseases.

To aid in your dental examination, our team may use dental X-rays to get a more in-depth understanding of your oral health, including areas of your mouth which may not be visible to the naked eye. This helps us ensure that any damaging conditions are spotted, diagnosed and treated as soon as possible. We recommend your routine cleaning and exam take place at least once every six months, and we may suggest more frequent visits depending on the condition of your teeth. If our team finds signs of periodontal disease, we may also recommend more intensive cleaning procedures, such as prophylaxis or scaling and root planing to help your mouth heal and prevent bone loss.

If you experience any kind of dental emergency or sudden dental pain, please call our office immediately. We will do our best to return your smile to full health as quickly as we can.

Deep Dental Cleanings (Prophylaxis)

The cleanings that we offer during your regular check-ins are basic, though thorough, preventive treatments. Even patients with consistent oral hygiene habits, however, have difficulty cleaning and protecting the part of their teeth that lies beneath their gumlines, and if these areas become infected or begin accumulating dental plaque, our dentist may recommend a specific type of dental cleaning procedure known as prophylaxis, or deep dental cleanings.

During prophylaxis, our dentist will remove the plaque and tartar building up beneath your gums and any difficult-to-reach areas. We will also scale and polish your tooth. The smoother surface will be less likely to attract and accumulate harmful bacteria in the future. This will give your mouth a chance to recover from periodontal disease and prevent it from developing further. This is also a good opportunity for our dentist to examine the health of your teeth below the gumlines.

If our dentist finds evidence of periodontal disease in your mouth during a routine examination, they will diagnose the severity of the disease and will likely recommend regular appointments at our office for prophylaxis. This schedule of deep cleanings will address the existing gum disease and help keep your mouth safe moving forward.

Scaling and Root Planing

If we detect gum disease in your smile, our team can offer scaling and root planing as an effective method for stopping the infection before it becomes severe. During scaling, we will remove dental calculus and plaque from the tooth surface. During root planing, we will clean the roots of the teeth themselves, smoothing those areas to remove stubborn bacterial toxins and make future build-up less likely. The goal of this treatment is to halt the progress of periodontal disease, and it can be split into multiple visits if the tartar build-up is widespread.

Scaling and root planing is a comfortable procedure that can be completed without anesthesia, and our team will do the best we can to help you feel at ease throughout. It may also be combined with antibiotic treatments or other forms of periodontal therapy.

To learn more about dental cleanings offered by our team and how we can help prevent and treat gum disease, call or visit our office today.