If there was a piece of equipment that could help you keep your mouth cleaner, with less effort, you’d probably want to try it wouldn’t you? Using a water flosser ensures you remove all traces of plaque from your teeth surfaces before it calcifies and contributes to tooth decay. Patients who use water flossers find them much more comfortable than string floss for a number of reasons. Let’s have a look at some of the pros of water floss vs dental floss.
Why Flossing Is So Important?
Brushing and flossing twice a day is still the most effective way to remove plaque and debris from the surface areas of your teeth. Even so, lots of patients neglect to floss for a number of reasons. While brushing correctly can remove a lot of plaque from the flat surfaces of your teeth, you do need to floss to penetrate below the gum line and to clean between each individual tooth.
This is important because failure to remove all the plaque means that it can harden in just 72 hours. Once it hardens it becomes a substance called tartar, which can only be removed by your dentist using special instrumentation.
Tartar becomes acidic on your dental enamel and can start to erode it. It also attracts more bacteria, which can lead to gum infection or tooth decay.
Regular brushing and flossing is the only way to remove it on a daily basis.
While the content of fluoridated toothpaste can help to protect your teeth against dental decay, flossing keeps your teeth clean and free of debris between brushing.
What Is A Water Flosser?
Water flossers or oral irrigators were created way back in 1962. They spurt a pressured stream of water when activated, which removes plaque, debris and trapped food from between the teeth and below the gum line. Water flossers need to be used correctly to work most efficiently.
What Are The Benefits Of Water Floss?
If you’ve struggled to use string floss, or your dentist has advised you to brush up on your dental hygiene, water flossers can make light work of a job that you need to do twice a day. There are plenty of good reasons to use water floss:
A Water Flosser Is Just Easier To Use
When patients visit their dentists for a bi-annual check-up, the issue of flossing tends to come up. Patients forget to floss, say they are too busy or just have a difficult time incorporating flossing into their oral care routine.
Using water flossers makes light work of something that is quite labour-intensive. To floss correctly, you need to give each tooth individual attention, cleaning all the way around it with a piece of dental floss. For some patients, this is quite labour-intensive and takes a while.
Using a water flosser gets the job done easily and much faster than trying to do it manually. If you know that your flossing technique could be improved, or think you could do a better job if you had the right tools, water flossers could benefit you.
Remember that your mouth is full of small spaces that are hard to access. Some of them are also hard to see too, making flossing twice a day a bit of a challenge. A water flosser can make this much easier to manage.
It’s Gentler On Your Gums
Not using string floss correctly, or using it on sensitive gums can result in bleeding and discomfort. Patients who have sensitive gums may find this off-putting and may not want to floss. Substituting string floss for a water flosser is much less abrasive.
Water Floss Vs Dental Floss: It’s Easier On Your Hands
For some patients, the issue of flossing may not be due to technique. For these patients, it is because they have limited mobility in their hands, and handling the floss is too difficult. If you have arthritis or carpal tunnel syndrome and find flossing to be too uncomfortable, there’s no reason why your dental health should suffer
Water Floss Vs Dental Floss: It Makes A Much Bigger Difference To Kids
Teaching your children to floss can be stressful because they need to learn how to do it correctly. And, as you probably know from your own experience, this may take some time to perfect. If you let your children use water flossers, it takes the pressure off both of you. You can relax and rest assured that your kids are cleaning between their teeth properly, and they can take their time learning the right technique.
Water Floss Vs Dental Floss: Keep Your Orthodontics Clean
Flossing with braces may be one of the most challenging techniques to learn.
Kids and teenagers who wear braces are told how important their dental hygiene is, in order to avoid dental decay, but flossing while wearing braces is certainly very challenging.
Water flossers make light work of an awkward task. When you have wires and brackets in your mouth, cleaning between your teeth and in between the braces is virtually impossible unless you have a water flosser at hand.
Give Your Tooth Replacements A Higher Standard Of Dental Care
If you have a dental crown on a dental implant or have a dental bridge, you may already know that you need to improve your oral care. Using a water flosser gives you peace of mind that you are cleaning around your crown or tooth replacement well enough that you can enjoy maximum wear from it.
What Are The Disadvantages Of Water Flossing?
The Price Is A Factor
String dental floss is relatively inexpensive and can last for a really long time. Compared with a water flosser, buying string floss is much more affordable in terms of your capital outlay.
To find out more about the pros and cons of water floss vs dental floss please contact us for an appointment: (02) 9159 6237.