Whether child or adult, preventive and consistent dental care routines need to be followed and encouraged throughout your life to retain the best smile possible and keep your teeth healthy. Dental exams and preventative dental care should be scheduled at your personally chosen dental care office on a routine basis every six months. Your dental health should be as important to your well-being as seeing your family doctor or pediatrician, since oral health is closely related to your entire body’s physical status. Poor oral hygiene can result in significant health issues for people of all ages.
Let’s look at how preventative dental care can provide many benefits for any age group, starting with children.
Children First — The Early Years
No matter what, many people delay or procrastinate dental care until they are in an emergency situation which requires significant restorative dentistry. Teaching our children to follow excellent dental hygiene by visiting with a hygienist and dentist on a regular basis, will go a long ways in avoiding many unnecessary dental situations.
Children should be seeing a pediatric dentist or your family dentist from an early age. The American Association of Pediatric Dentistry suggests:
“First dental visits are mostly educational. The AAPD recommends that every child visit the dentist by the child’s first birthday. The American Dental Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend a child visit the dentist by age one as well. This “well baby check” for the teeth can establish a dental home and helps ensure that parents learn the tools they’ll need to help their children remain cavity free (www.aapd.org)”
Building Healthy Habits
Visiting a dentist for your preventive dental care should be on your calendar every six months rather than waiting until a painful situation occurs and you are desperate
for treatment. Certainly, emergency treatment can be provided by your local dentist, but generally at an increased cost and discomfort to the patient so it is important to maintain regular visits to your dentist’s office.
The real gist of the situation is that if you plan and implement preventive dental care, you can largely avoid some of the more costly and painful occurrences from happening at all. Regularly scheduled dental exams can show any problems (hidden or otherwise) that can be treated prior to more extensive work becoming necessary.
Keeping the appointments with your dental care provider of choice will allow you and your family to have beautiful smiles and know your dental health is in tip-top shape. Children are not the only ones who need to learn proper and regular oral hygiene, healthy habits should be practiced for a lifetime. Many people have neglected their oral and dental health care for too long due to fears, misgivings, and simple avoidance techniques.
The danger is that small dental issues that could have been treated early on, causing little to no discomfort, turn into larger situations which require not only more time and expense, but often times a larger amount of discomfort while you are waiting for treatment. Don’t waste time avoiding preventive dental care when this is just as important as your primary health care provider treating and caring for you on a regular basis.
Preventive Dental Care at Progressive Dental 
Progressive Dental provides optimal preventive dental care services to children, teens and adults including full dental exams in our local dental offices. Progressive Dental is available to address the oral health needs of our patients no matter what their age and we look forward to providing you and your family with the preventive oral care necessary for your family to maintain a bright and healthy smile for a lifetime.
We have a professional and knowledgeable staff that can assist you in scheduling a convenient appointment that works with your schedule and will meet your specific dental needs to provide an excellent experience whether you need assistance with an emergency or are ready to visit us for the first time. At Progressive Dental our services include; dental cleaning, exams, treatment, whitening, dentures, bridges and dental x-rays for the whole family. Contact one of our dental offices near you, to schedule your dental exam today.
