5 Ways To Improve Your Oral Hygiene and Stay Healthy

Good dental health is crucial to your overall health. When you improve your oral hygiene, you can reduce the risk of other serious health conditions.

Ensuring our teeth are in good condition is important as we rely on our teeth to enjoy our food and of course, keep smiling.

Failure to maintain good oral hygiene can impact our health and lead to tooth decay and gum disease. Although tooth decay and gum disease are treatable, it is always best to prevent the issue rather than wait for it to get worse.

Treatments can be painful and expensive, so why not maintain good oral hygiene and avoid those painful dental procedures?

Let us look at 5 ways you can improve your oral hygiene.

1. Brush Twice A Day

Brushing your teeth regularly is obviously one of the most effective ways to improve your oral hygiene. When we eat, food debris gets stuck in our teeth and if we do not brush, this can turn to plaque. If the plaque is left sitting on the teeth for long enough, it can cause tooth decay or gum disease.

Brushing your teeth is an effective method to remove the food debris that gets stuck. Some people find it difficult to get into the habit of brushing their teeth twice a day, but if you try to remember once when you wake up and once before bed, you will start to get into the routine.

2. Floss

Flossing goes hand in hand with brushing your teeth. When we brush our teeth, sometimes it can be difficult to clean between the teeth efficiently. Floss is an interdental cleaner that helps deep clean your teeth and get rid of food particles lurking between your teeth.

While brushing your teeth after you wake up and before you go to bed, take a little extra time to floss. Make it a habit. This is a great way to improve your oral hygiene.

How to floss? Hold a couple of inches of floss between your fingers. Using your index fingers to guide the floss between the lower teeth, gently guide the floss between the teeth with a zig zag motion. Then wrap the floss around the side of the tooth and slide it up and down against the surface of the tooth and under the gumline to clean your teeth.

After brushing and flossing, use mouthwash to remove leftover food particles.

3. Consider Orthodontic Treatment

Orthodontic treatment could be another option to improve your oral hygiene, especially if you have gaps in your teeth or have overlapping teeth. Essentially, orthodontic treatment involves closing gaps in the teeth and straightening the teeth. When teeth overlap, it can be difficult to clean them, leading to plaque build-up, which in turn leads to tooth decay and gum disease.

With orthodontic treatment, the two main options are metal braces and clear aligners. While both do the same job, the prices may vary.  This article about teeth straightening costs with Straight My Teeth has more information.

4. Visit Your Dentist For Regular Check-Ups

To maintain and improve your oral hygiene, it is important to visit your dentist for preventive maintenance. We often tend to think that just because there are no obvious problems or pain, there is no need to see the dentist. But the truth is, regular visits to your dentist mean preventive care that will help catch any problems before they become worse and get timely treatment.

Ideally, schedule an appointment with your dentist at least once in six months, depending on the condition of your teeth. For example, ignoring a small cavity can very well lead to major problems, not to mention the expenses. By attending to it right away, your teeth stay healthy.  Dentists also advise having your teeth cleaned professionally at least once a year.

5. Change Your Diet

Diet plays a huge role in improving our oral hygiene and there are certain foods that can have a negative impact. Sugar is one of the leading causes of tooth decay and if you tend to eat a lot of sugary food, you could be causing serious damage to your teeth.

Some examples of sugar foods are fizzy drinks and sweets. If you have them multiple times a day, they coat our teeth and can gradually erode the enamel. While you do not need to cut out all things sweet from your diet, try to limit them. Also, make sure you rinse your mouth thoroughly after consuming these foods.

Pay attention to your diet and ensure that you eat fruits and vegetables. Crunchy fruits like apples and pears and vegetables like carrots and cucumbers are not only good for your overall health but also keep your teeth clean.

Some lifestyle tips to improve your oral hygiene

Remember that to improve your oral hygiene, good lifestyle habits are important. Here are some tips:

1. Stop smoking to improve your overall health
2. Clean your tongue when you brush and floss your teeth.
3. Change your toothbrush every three months for efficient brushing.
4. Rinse your mouth after you drink coffee, tea, and other beverages foods that can stain your teeth.

As I mentioned earlier, good dental health has a big role in your overall health. When you improve your oral hygiene, you are also making sure that you lower the risk for other serious health conditions.