5 Must-Do Tasks Before Your Dental Visit
Be prepared to get the most out of your routine dental visit.
Is it about time for your annual or semi-annual dental cleaning and exam? After you make your appointment at California Dental Group, be sure to tick these 5 must-do tasks off your list to make sure you’re prepared to maximize the benefits of your dental visit.
Write Down Your Questions
A dental cleaning and exam is an excellent opportunity to get expert answers to all your dental questions. But, you have to remember what those questions are! It definitely does not hurt to write down questions as they occur to you in the weeks or even months leading up to your appointment.
Maintain Your Normal Routine
Sometimes people feel the urge to step up their oral care routine in preparation for visiting the dentist. Maybe they want to impress the dentist with their nice clean teeth or maybe they think they can honestly claim they habitually floss every day if they’ve done so every day of the week before their appointment. While we would never tell you NOT to start doing a better job cleaning your teeth, whatever your motivation, it is important not to go overboard right before your dental visit. First of all, you want the dentist to get an accurate picture of your oral hygiene as it really is all year long. Secondly, if you suddenly start brushing too hard you might actually damage your tooth enamel or irritate your gums.
Get Your Dental Records
Having an understanding of your dental history is very important to a dentist’s ability to provide the best treatment for your unique case. If you are visiting a new dentist for the first time, it will greatly expedite matters if you can bring your dental records with you or have them sent to the office before your visit.
Check Your Insurance Benefits
Dental x-rays will be taken periodically as part of your routine dental care. Dentists and insurance providers disagree on how often this needs to happen. Because dentists often recommend more frequent x-rays—especially if a dental issue is suspected—it is important to know if you’ve used up your x-ray benefit or not. By reviewing your insurance benefits beforehand, you won’t have to guess at whether or not you’ll end up footing the bill. Reviewing your insurance benefits can also help you decide whether or not you want to get any restorative or cosmetic treatments the dentist may recommend during your exam.
Brush Your Teeth
The final must-do for preparing for a dental visit is to brush your teeth! No dental hygienist wants to be confronted with bits of a patient’s lunch when they start a cleaning.
See you in one of our clinics soon!
