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Dr. Gire will tell you that keeping your teeth clean is more important than ever when you have braces. Food bits have more spots than usual to hide in your mouth, so you must be diligent in order to avoid bad breath, swollen gums, discolored teeth and cavities. If you remove plaque regularly during treatment, you’ll experience better results and could possibly reduce your treatment time.

At Gire Orthodontics, we provide a home care kit that includes floss and floss threaders to each patient that gets braces. We demo their use with the patient’s new braces and on a typodont to ensure excellent compliance.

When we demo flossing, we stress to the patients that they should not use a “sawing” motion in between the teeth. We instruct the patients to use a “C” shape around each tooth on both sides and use an up and down motion at least 3 times.

Also, we stress home care in this order:
1. Floss
2. Brush
3. Rinse

You’d be surprised at how many patients brush first and then floss. We tell them to floss all the food and stuff from between the teeth, then brush it away, and finally rinse to get everything squeaky clean! For more tips, check out this helpful video:

According to the American Dental Association, a person’s smile outranked eyes, hair and body as the most important physical feature, which is why it’s important for our team at Gire Orthodontics to support National Smile Month this June.

Here are a few simple steps you can take to improve your oral health so that you may celebrate National Smile Month for many, many years to come:

* Brush at least twice a day with fluoride toothpaste. Here’s a helpful video showing you how to brush with your braces on.
* Floss every day to clean between your teeth.
* Reduce your intake of sugary foods and drinks during your orthodontic treatment with Dr. Gire.
* Visit your dentist regularly (usually every six months apart).

If you have questions about any of these tips, we encourage you to give us a call.