What happens during a cleaning?

There are basically two types of dental cleanings. There’s a preventative dental cleaning, which is for somebody who has, for the most part, a very, very healthy mouth. This means they have good structure and tissues in terms of their gum area and the bone and supporting structures of their teeth. We call this cleaning a prophylaxis or a prophy. The other type of cleaning is a periodontal cleaning.

With a prophy cleaning at Murfreesboro Family Dentistry, we remove any type of build up of plaque, or hardened plaque called calculus, off of your teeth from above your gum lines. Prophylaxis cleaning is the removal of the plaque and then polishing. We polish the teeth with a pumice solution that helps give you that fresh and shiny feeling to your teeth.

Periodontal Cleaning

Now, if a patient has periodontal disease or gum disease, we make sure to show them areas where we see there are problems. What we do then is numb the mouth and remove any areas of plaque and calculus found below the gum line through periodontal treatment. When a patient has periodontal disease, we’ll use a little water sprayer, called a cavatron. This helps us remove the build-up of plaque and calculus from below the gum line.