Healthy Mouths ARE Essential For Everyone
COVID-19 has disrupted our lives like no other disease in our lifetime. Like you, we want to do our part to reduce the spread of this infection as much as possible.
At the same time, the other health issues that affect us are still here even in the midst of COVID-19. People still get cavities, gum disease, and tooth infections. If those issues go untreated, they can lead to even worse problems for your oral and your overall health.
Knowing this, our team at My Dentist In Plano strongly disagrees with some recent statements by the World Health Organization about what is considered an “essential” or “nonessential” service at this time.
Oral Health Is Necessary
“Oral health is integral to overall health. Dentistry is essential health care,” ADA President Chad P. Gehani, D.D.S said. “Dentistry is essential health care because of its role in evaluating, diagnosing, preventing, or treating oral diseases, which can affect systemic health.”
We whole-heartedly believe the oral care should be considered an essential health care service.
When you come to our office, we do much more than just remove plaque and tartar and clean your teeth. We are being proactive to prevent small problems from turning into large ones.
We’ll give just a few examples of why dental care remains important:
- People who have periodontal disease are more likely to develop heart disease, to have complications with diabetes, and to experience other systemic health issues. By taking steps to prevent and treat gum infections today, you could avoid more serious issues down the road.
- When patients come to our office, we perform oral cancer screenings. According to the Oral Cancer Foundation, patients whose oral cancer is found early have an 80 to 90 percent chance of surviving. Postponing dental visits makes it less likely that this kind of cancer will be found early.
- Your oral health also affects your ability to eat nutritious food. When you lose teeth or have inadequate replacements, your diet will be limited if you can’t bite and chew effectively. With restorative dental care, we can replace missing teeth so you can continue eating a variety of foods.
Emergency Care Is Always Needed
The WHO agrees that urgent care, such as dental emergencies, is still essential. That’s nice, but, we also know that it’s better to take action to prevent emergencies.
This is why we believe “oral health check-ups, dental cleanings, and preventive care” should be seen as essential as well. By removing the conditions that lead to cavities, infections, and tooth loss, you are much less likely to need emergency treatment. To be clear, we are ready to help you deal with oral emergencies, but we would rather help you avoid them.
The best way to do that is with routine visits to our office.
You’re Safety Is Always A Priority
As dental professionals, we have always made it a priority to keep our office clean and sterile. With COVID-19, we have implemented even more stringent procedures than the state of Texas and the CDC require to keep you and our team members as safe as possible while you are at our office.
WE ARE COVID-19 HYPER-VIGILANT. Our team uses all the required CDC PPE (personal protective equipment) and more (full gowns, face shields, and N95s). In addition to that, we have sealed operatory rooms. This allows us to create a negative flow air circulation system using medical-grade HEPA 13 filters to turn over the air and remove circulating particulate matter every 15 minutes in each room. We use both an intraoral is dry system and an external industrial over-the-mouth vacuum with five-layer filtration to remove aerosolized water particles as they exit the mouth while we are caring for all of our patients.
If you have any questions about our dental services and procedures, please feel free to contact us. Better yet, schedule an appointment to see for yourself what we are doing to keep you and all our patients safe and healthy.
Call My Dentist In Plano today or contact us online to request your next dental appointment in Plano, TX.