The first step is to have a good dental hygiene is to have a correct personal daily hygiene, a good brushing of the teeth without forgetting the brushing of the tongue. The second step, almost as important as the first, is a correct diet, avoiding excess sugars, especially when taken continuously, since saliva has a neutralizing factor of the acid that generates the intake of sugars. This time in which the saliva neutralizes the acid is twenty minutes, that is to say if we take a candy now and a candy in 20 minutes and another in twenty minutes is the worst of the effects. The ideal is if we have three candies, consume them all now and in twenty minutes we will recover the natural pH of the mouth that will prevent our teeth from decay. Caries is nothing more than a low pH, an acid pH caused by sugar.
Also eat fiber, eat lots of vegetables, salads, foods that have vitamins to keep our mucous membranes healthy. And finally, regular visits to the dentist, that is, prevention.
How often should we go to the dentist?
The usual frequency of dental visits for a healthy person should be every year. However, there are people who have some pathology already detected, such as periodontal gum disease or caries with a lot of activity, and then this periodicity will be reduced to every four or six months, depending on what the professional indicates.
In a first visit we will have a more in-depth examination than in the following ones, in which a series of data will be collected that will be useful for the rest of the patient’s evolution; for example, photographs, x-rays, scans of the mouth, etc. There is no more than the criteria that the dentist always advises when following up with the patient.