How Long Does Deep Teeth Cleaning Take?
Deep cleaning is extremely beneficial when you have excessive buildup of plaque, tartar, or calculus on the roots of your teeth. This accumulation causes inflammation and swelling of the soft tissue surrounding your teeth. This leads to bleeding and painful gums, bone loss, and even tooth loss.
Deep cleaning, also called root planning and scaling, is a procedure that focuses on the removal of plaque and tartar from below your gun line and on the surface of the roots.
Your dentist will use a variety of steps and measures to decide if you need a deep teeth cleaning. This includes the initial exam, periodontal probing, a measurement of the pockets around each tooth, and x-rays to look at your teeth below the surface.
How Does your Dentist Determine if You Need a Deep Teeth Cleaning?
- X-rays- Your dentist will look at the jawbone density and the shape of the bone near the root of each tooth. With x-rays, they can identify bone loss and damage, and based on the depth and the bone loss, will then decide if a deep teeth cleaning is needed.
- Periodontal Probing- There is a gap or pocket around each tooth that is measured with a small device called a perio probe. Normal pocket depth is three millimeters or less. A bigger gap is another strong indicator of gum disease.
How Long Does a Deep Teeth Cleaning Take?
- Clinical Exam- Your dentist will be looking for any swelling or bleeding of the gums around your teeth. Another indicator is if your teeth appear to be at all loose. A tooth that can be moved with simple light finger pressure suggests bone loss.
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What Benefits will You Experience After a Deep Cleaning?
If your dentist determines that a deep teeth cleaning is necessary, then a regular preventative cleaning will not be enough to return you to proper oral health.
When there is a bacterial infection buildup in gum tissue, a deep cleaning is absolutely mandatory to remove the gum disease. If a regular cleaning is completed, there is still bacteria left on the teeth below the gumline, which is the primary source of the harm to the gums.
The amount of time your deep teeth cleaning takes depends on several variables.
- Any other medical conditions you may have regarding the procedure.
- Your own anxiety level throughout the treatment.
- How severe the damage is from the buildup.
- Whether it is just a part of your mouth or your entire mouth.
You may have only a few teeth or one area of your mouth that needs deep cleaning. For a full-mouth deep cleaning, only half of your mouth is treated per appointment, requiring two appointments.
For a half-mouth deep teeth cleaning, your appointment will run about 90 minutes. This includes time for post-treatment x-rays and to review your recovery instructions.
The average time for a partial deep teeth cleaning visit is approximately 45 minutes.
Immediately after your deep teeth cleaning you might have s
