Dental Laymans Terms And Explanations

1. Scale and Polish

What is a scale and polish?

A scale and polish is a procedure aimed to remove plaque and calculus in order to have a clean mouth. It is recommended that an adult visits the dentist every six months and a child every 4 – 6 months

2. Fillings

What is a filling?

A filling is the process of removing decay from a tooth and replacing the decayed tooth with a filling material. At Claremont dental studio we use white composite resin restoration which matches your teeth colour beautifully.

3. Extractions

What is an extraction?

An extraction is the removal of a tooth which is so decayed that it is beyond repair.

4. Crown and Bridges

A crown is a single tooth capping.

• For a front tooth it is aimed for aesthetic (looks) reasons and for a back tooth aimed to give you added strength and longevity.

A bridge is a process of replacing a missing tooth or teeth. Both a crown and a bridge are fixed in your mouth and are not removable except by the dentist.

• It is important for the patient to understand that adjacent teeth (sometimes even healthy) teeth needs to be cut in order to support the bridge.

Before bridge placement	After bridge placement

5. Teeth Whitening (Bleaching)

Teeth whitening is a process in which your teeth gets bleached in order to get lighter in colour.

bottom teeth are before photo and the top teeth is after photos

6. Dentures

Dentures or false teeth is another method of replacing missing or extracted teeth. They should be removed at night for cleaning. You get plastic (or acrylic) dentures and metal (chrome) dentures.

• Plastic dentures are generally cheaper
• Patient compliance and taste is better with chrome dentures

7. Conscious Sedation

Conscious sedation is aimed at terrified patients. The anaethetist puts up a drip and sedates the patient. Dental procedures are done and although the patient is awake, they are sedated and don’t remember anything.

8. Deep Relaxing Therapy

Deep relaxation therapy is a state of physical relaxation in which the patient is awake and relaxed. Once the state of relaxation is achieved then the dentist begins with the dental procedure. It is relatively cheap, and works well with almost all patients including the immunocompromised. No side effects has been recorded.

9. General Anesthetic

Using halothane the patient is “put under” using general anaesthetic. Once the patient is asleep dental procedures are done.

10. Nitrous Oxide Sedation (Laughing Gas)

Using a mixture of nitrogen and oxygen the patient is relaxed and dental procedures can then be performed. Patient must be healthy.