Mouthwash

Mouthwash is a liquid that is used to fight tooth decay and to prevent acid from damaging your teeth. At Fresh Meadows Dental, we encourage you to incorporate mouthwash into your daily oral health care routine. Fluoride is a mineral used in mouthwash to make your teeth stronger and is resist tooth decay that is caused by acid and bacteria.

To maximize the effectiveness of mouthwash, we recommend that you use mouthwash consistently and at the same time every day. We want all of our patients to have a proper and well-balanced diet for healthy teeth. Don’t forget to avoid eating or drinking for at least 30 minutes after using mouthwash.

 Regardless if you use mouthwash or not, it shouldn’t be a substitute for brushing and flossing. When you brush twice a day and use fluoride you are setting yourself up for healthy teeth! 

 

Farid Hakimzadeh, DDS, operates Fresh Meadows Dental Care at 58-47 Francis Lewis Blvd., Suite 100, Flushing, New York, 11364. To schedule an appointment, call 718-224-7272 or visit Fresh Meadows Dental and fill out a contact form.

Children's Oral Health Month

At Fresh Meadows Dental, we want all of our younger patients to practice good oral health care. Every February the American Dental Association (ADA) raises awareness of children’s oral health with National Children’s Dental Health Month.  We encourage you to help your kids learn more about the importance of taking care of teeth so they have a healthy smile for years to come.

Tooth decay is the most common chronic disease among children which is preventable with good health oral care. We advise our patients to floss and brush twice a day to prevent tooth decay. Flossing removes 40%of the bacteria on your teeth and brushing with fluoride toothpaste removes the rest.

When possible, we encourage our patients to avoid eating foods that have a lot of sugar and are acidic that increase your chances of developing tooth decay. The healthier your child eats, the greater chance their teeth will be decay free.

Don’t forget to schedule a cleaning with us twice a year so your children have their best smile!

Farid Hakimzadeh, DDS, operates Fresh Meadows Dental Care at 58-47 Francis Lewis Blvd., Suite 100, Flushing, New York, 11364. To schedule an appointment, call 718-224-7272 or visit Fresh Meadows Dental and fill out a contact form.

Pericoronitis - Infections around Crowns

Gingivitis, or gum inflammation, could develop into a serious health concern if it’s not dealt with. We regularly treat patients struggling with gum infections at Fresh Meadows Dental Care in Flushing, but when inflammation is recurrent around an impacted tooth, an extraction might be necessary.

Pericoronitis is the name dentists give to infections surrounding a natural crown. Teeth are said to be “impacted” when they are unable to push through the gum line. This most often happens to the wisdom teeth, which are the largest and usually the last to erupt. By the time they emerge in late adolescence, the patient’s jawbones have fused together and they have usually finished orthodontic therapy. As a result, the wisdom teeth are overcrowded and get stuck partway through erupting, leaving them partially covered by a flap of gum tissue called an operculum. The operculum often becomes inflamed when bacteria build up beneath it.

Patients can combat pericoronitis by taking oral antibacterial medication and rinsing their mouths with saltwater. But if the operculum does not recede, it will keep on getting infected until it or the wisdom tooth is removed. As part of our care for teenage patients, we’ll investigate for warning signs that a tooth is likely to be impacted before overcrowding or infections develop.

Farid Hakimzadeh, DDS, operates Fresh Meadows Dental Care at 58-47 Francis Lewis Blvd., Suite 100, Flushing, New York, 11364. To schedule an appointment, call 718-224-7272 or visit Fresh Meadows Dental and fill out a contact form.

Causes of Bad Breath

Halitosis, or bad breath, is a common oral health problem. Preventing it is one of the many reasons why we at Fresh Meadows Dental Care in Flushing want our patients to know how to maintain their oral hygiene. But halitosis has a few causes that may be less intuitive than gum disease or smoking that people should know to look out for.

As oral bacteria on teeth metabolize sugar, they produce acid and build up sticky layers of plaque. The build-up produces a bad smell which abates when plaque is removed by brushing and flossing. But oral bacteria can also build up on the tongue. Not only can food particles be trapped there, so can nasal drip when a patient has a cold. This is why brushing the tongue and using a tongue scraper every day is important.

Halitosis could also indicate a more serious health concern. Bacteria will multiply faster when the mouth is dried out. Both halitosis and gum disease tend to be worse in people suffering dry mouth as a side effect of medication or an illness. Diabetes suppresses the oral immune system and raises the sugar content of saliva, while acid reflux causes odorous stomach acid to enter the oral cavity. Foods in the onion and garlic family also include chemicals that travel from the bloodstream and into the lungs, where they cause bad breath. Most of these can be mitigated by drinking lots of water in addition to keeping good oral hygiene. A patient’s physician may be able to substitute medications that are causing dry mouth.

Farid Hakimzadeh, DDS, operates Fresh Meadows Dental Care at 58-47 Francis Lewis Blvd., Suite 100, Flushing, New York, 11364. To schedule an appointment, call 718-224-7272 or visit Fresh Meadows Dental and fill out a contact form.