Busting Myths Related To Dentistry (Part 1)

"No, mom, I don't want to visit the dentist. They pull out your teeth, it's so painful. My friends told me all about it", yelled the son as he was being forced for a dental check-up by his mom. "Leave him be, please. He's not wrong though, dentists do mess up your teeth" said the day in a stern voice. The mom sat there, exasperated on the childish behavior of her husband and her child. I stood there in silence and a despair and thought to myself, "where did we go wrong? How can we change this narrative amongst the general public?" That's when I realized no one's coming to our rescue. The dentists themselves will have to take reins in their hands in order to drag people out of this ignorance.

There are a lot of myths and superstitions associated with the dental field and trust me they're 100% real. I encounter superstitious patients on daily basis. Only recently, I had a patient who was insisting on giving back his extracted tooth to him as he wanted to bury it alongside him in his grave. I mean???

Anyway, in this post, I'll be busting the most common myths associated with Dentistry. Let's begin:

BUSTING MYTHS RELATED TO DENTISTRY

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There are numerous myths and a lot of superstitions related to dental work. Some have been so common that more than 90% of people consider it as the truth. In this post, I'll be talking about some particular myths that have been integrated into our daily lives. The most common one is:

SCALING WEAKENS TEETH

Oh God, this is the most common thing that I face on daily basis. I used to think, in my early years of BDS, that the counselors are emphasizing alot more than needed but now when I face patients in clinics, I have realized that they were right the whole time. Before clearing up the confusions related to scaling, let me just tell what scaling actually is

Scaling, simply, is the cleaning of your teeth, which is carried out by an ultrasonic scaler in order to get rid of all the calculus, plaque and the accumulated bacteria on the surface of your teeth.

This is a perfect representation of a scaling case. In this picture you can appreciate the difference between the before and after pictures of the upper teeth. This is what scaling does to you. Literally gives you the much needed confidence and hygiene that you've been lacking for a long time.

Coming back to the myth related to scaling, the most common one is that our teeth get weak due to scaling. I don't blame my patients for this mindset as the sensitivity surely does increase after getting your teeth cleaned but it has got nothing to do with your teeth getting fragile. Don't worry, in this post, I'll clear everything and hopefully you won't be having any doubts after that.

You see, when you haven't had a visit to a dentist for a very long time, a lot of food debris starts to get deposited into the pocket. A pocket is the space between your teeth and the gums. The food and bacteria gets accumulated on the surface of your teeth as well as the pocket. This goes on for months and years as you are scared of scaling. There comes a time when the bacterial invasion proceeds a lot deeper and that is when you get prone to a bit severe issues such as periodontitis. Periodontitis is a severe gum disease which can result in loss of your tooth.

Scaling prevents this extreme bacterial invasion and in return stops inflammation of the gums. It cleans the surface of the tooth as well as the pockets. "But doctor, why do I feel pain after scaling? Why does it hurt when I drink something hot or cold? You've ruined my teeth." No I haven't. A bit of sensitivity is completely normal and I'll explain it you.

When there has been bacterial and food deposition for a very long period of time, and the dentist removes it through scaling, naturally, there remains a small space where the deposition was. Due to this space, any hot or cold thing might hurt for a very small period of time. Don't worry, the space will be naturally filled in a couple of days and the sensitivity will just vanish. If still, you are not convinced, I'll give you a solution. You have 32 teeth, right? I'll clean only one of them and you can tell me if your tooth falls off. If it doesn't, which I'm sure it won't, we can proceed to the rest of the teeth. Sounds cool?

In conclusion, scaling doesn't weaken your teeth. It saves you from much severe diseases.

FLOSSING CREATES GAP BETWEEN MY TEETH

This has to be the second most common myth associated with oral hygiene. Infact, where I come from, 70% of the people don't even know what flossing is and those who know, have completely succumbed to myths. "Do you floss after your meals?" "Floss, what's that?" Is what I mostly hear from my patients. The rest of the people just say "No doctor, I once tried flossing, it was so painful, I threw it away."

Floss is absolutely essential for a healthy oral hygiene. The public in general have ignored the importance of flossing for God knows how long and honestly I don't blame them for this. Flossing is a bit painful in the beginning and it's usually these initial steps, in which the people decide they don't need flossing anymore.

What does flossing do? Why is it so important? It removes the interdental food particles. It removes plaque and calculus which in turn helps you in preventing gum diseases.

This is what a floss looks like. It's literally a medicated thread that you use between your teeth. Now, coming to the myths that have been in relation to flossing:

"Flossing is painful." Yes it might be painful at first. You see, when you hit the gym for the first time, your muscles get sore but once you're used to it, it gets normal? It's the same with flossing. The bacteria and the plaque stuck between your teeth don't want to leave their resting place and when you're forcing them out through flossing, they resist. You shouldn't give up on flossing if it's painful. But, if the pain doesn't stop even after weeks of flossing, it's probably due to wrong technique or maybe some underlying issues. For that, you need to visit your dentist.

"My gums bleed when I floss." Well, that's a good thing isn't it? You see, I always tell my patients that pain is a blessing from God. If there's no pain, you won't ever be able to find out whether there's something wrong with the body. Fever is a blessing. Fever is your body's reaction to some underlying issues going on in your body. It's literally your body leting you know, there's something not right inside. Similarly, if your gums are bleeding while flossing its probably because you have gingivitis that you didn't know about. Or because, you're doing it wrong. In any case, you should never stop flossing.

"It creates gap between my teeth." This has to be the commonest myth related to flossing. I have encountered numerous patients justifying not flossing with this reason. So I'll address it here once again. Flossing doesn't creat gao between your teeth. You feel like there's a gap created after flossing because the food particles stuck interdentally have been removed. The plaque has been removed. The teeth are now in their natural habitat and they don't have bacterias compressing them from all sides. So yes, it might feel there's a gap between your teeth, trust me it's not true.

BRUSHING AGGRESSIVELY CLEANS BETTER

No, God! Please No! It doesn't. Please stop doing that to yourself. Please stop harming yourself. Literally, my friends, relatives and the people I know wo closely have given in to this. They believe that if we brush aggressively, it will remove the yellowish deposit on the teeth. I don't even blame them. It's something that's closely associated to the human race. Aggressiveness is predominantly found in males and generally speaking, in everyone. I'll be busting this myth as well.

Aggressively brushing your teeth, or as I like to call it, fighting with your teeth is extremely harmful for your oral health. It erodes the outer most surface of your teeth, the enamel, and in some cases, it erodes the inner layer, dentine, as well. Brushing hard will never ever clean your teeth in a more effective manner, instead it'll leave you with tooth sensitivity. Brushing harder will result in gum recession and will cause a lot of problems for you.

There are two types of bristles available in tooth brushes. Soft bristles and hard bristles. You should always buy the soft ones. I know a lot of you don't even know about this as it's not very common. Next time, when you're buying a brush, turn it over and on the back you'll find it written whether the brush is soft or hard.

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The picture above is a perfect case of tooth erosion due to excessive, hard brushing. Make sure, you're not one of those.

The goal is to spread awareness as much as possible. It hurts me to see people suffering due to lack of awareness. For this reason, I have taken this on myself to educate the general population as much as possible. This was the part 1 of busting myths related to dentistry. I'll come up with part 2 very soon. If you found this post helpful, do let me know in the comments section.
Regards

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WHO IS HUZAIFANAVEED?

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_{huzaifanaveed hails from Pakistan, who is an aspiring dentist, studying in one of the top notch universities of Pakistan, Jinnah Sindh Medical University.}

_{he loves interacting with new people, making new friends and traveling the world, but most importantly he loves to make a change in this world through his actions and his words. He's an entrepreneur and a philanthropist who's been actively working with different Charitable Organizations in Pakistan.}

_{His goal on Hive is similar, ie, to make a difference. He's here to mark his presence and he'll do it through his words. So lets be a part of his journey and show him support through comments, upvotes and reblogs.}

All pictures used in this article are my own, unless stated otherwise.

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