What You Should Know Before Getting Dental Sealants

Proactive healthcare is the best kind of care. It is the one way to ensure you are leading a high-quality lifestyle. When it comes to proactivity regarding health, many people do not remember to include dental care. Any proactive preventive measures you put forth for your dental health will bear much fruit in the long run. Some dental measures like dental sealants, for instance, have positively impacted the lives of many patients over the years. This too could be your story.

What Are Dental Sealants?

They are thin plastic coatings painted on the pits and fissures of back teeth to act as a protective layer that can protect teeth against dental cavities. As such, tooth sealants are used in preventive dentistry to maintain good oral health proactively. Because tooth sealants fill up only the fits and fissures of teeth, it is common to have them referred to as fissure sealants.

How Do Dental Sealants Work?

A dentist in East York, Toronto, ON, will first conduct a dental exam to evaluate the state of your teeth. Technically, sealants are only useful for preventive dental care. As such, they cannot be considered as solutions for tooth decay treatment. If therefore, your teeth already have dental cavities, you will not be qualified to receive dental sealants.

The target area of sealant treatment is the back teeth. The dentist will then clean up your molars and premolars, preparing for the sealant application process. The cleaning step will help remove all plaque and food residues from your teeth so that they are not sealed under the sealants after your treatment. Afterward, the sealant material is painted on the chewing surfaces of your teeth. The material fills the pits and fissures thereof, which becomes the protective layer against bacteria that cause dental caries and tooth decay. Usually, blue light is used to set the sealant and bond it to your teeth.

Who Needs Dental Sealants?

In many cases, the patients in Danforth Village Dental Care who receive dental sealants are children. It is because children are very prone to dental cavities, especially between the ages of 6 and 14 years. It is why dental sealants in East York are common in pediatric dentistry. However, it is not to imply that adults too cannot benefit from sealants. Ideally, as long as you have natural back teeth, like premolars and molars, you are a suitable candidate for dental sealants.

What Are the Consequences of Getting Dental Sealants?

Once your treatment is complete, you should expect some of the following things:

1. Improved oral hygiene – the deep pits and fissures of the back teeth can make proper oral hygiene hard to attain for children and adults alike. Once you receive dental sealants, the depth of the fissures will not cause too much trouble regarding proper oral hygiene.
2. Decreased risk of dental cavities – although dental sealants do not reverse dental cavities or treat tooth decay, they are very effective for preventing them. Dental research shows that kids who receive dental sealants early in life have a significantly lower chance of getting dental cavities even as they age.
3. Stronger teeth – the aspect of dental sealants where fluoride is released gradually and slowly on teeth is rarely known by many people. This unique aspect ensures that teeth are enriched with fluoride, a natural mineral that boosts the strength of teeth. Fluoride also plays a huge role in fighting dental decay and can even reverse the development of small cavities on teeth.
4. Saving on costs – at first, you may not quite understand how sealants help you save on costs. Not until you realize that it has been years before you ever needed emergency dental care or restorative treatments for your oral cavity.

Are Sealants Necessary?

Preventive dental care should not be approached as a matter of necessity. Taking a proactive step toward caring for your oral cavity is necessary, even though you may not quite see the results immediately. As such, you should consider getting tooth sealants, even for your child. However, you should not think that sealant treatments are substitutes for proper oral habits and hygiene. Even with dental sealants, you must still be diligent with proper oral hygiene, healthy dietary choices, and good oral habits.