Hands up if you’ve got a dental crown?? Ok I don’t actually have any myself (yet - gulp) but I know lots and lots of you guys do, so I though I would put a quick cheat sheet together as a recap of what we’ve discussed in surgery today or just as a little refresher.

So if I am your Dental Hygienist, I have probably demonstrated how to clean you dental crown/bridge in the hand mirror so you can see exactly what’s going on. This is 100% the best way to explain to you how to clean around these areas as it’s tailor made for you with the right product for the job and it gives you an opportunity to ask questions, although of course you can certainly message me through the Contact Us section if you would like to. If you have any doubts about cleaning your dental crown or bridge ask you Dentist or Dental Hygienist to go over this with you at your appointment, I have seen lots of absolutely beautiful dental crowns become very inflamed and unsightly at the point where the crown meets your gums because of poor oral hygiene.

Lets start with crowns. The issue is that crowns are not shaped like natural teeth so we need to clean then a bit differently.

There is a tiny tiny space between where your crown is and where you gum line is and this tiny gap is a MASSIVE plaque trap. Plaque causes inflammation redness and tenderness in the area turning your lovely crowns from this….

to this ….

See how red these crowns look at the gum line? The good news is that this is completely reversible with a change in your oral hygiene routine at home or having the right tool for the job. The problem is if we do nothing we could develop Gum Disease around these crowns which could mean a long expensive visit with your Dental Hygienist or Dentist.

Dental bridges are a similar story, a dental bridge is a tooth or teeth that we float off or in between two crowns to give the impression of a full arch of teeth SUPER idea. The problem is again this microscopic space between the bridge and the gum line. The dental bridge is actually floating on top of the gum, which lets plaque and food - gross - collect under here causing inflammation and sometimes bad breath too. This will turn a dental bridge that looks like this….

To this….

Again you can see how red the dental bridge above looks at the gum line. But what can we do about this? Luckily I have a few tricks up my sleeve.

Firstly my absolute go to products for cleaning dental crowns and bridges is XFloss lite from IDontix which we have talked before in my blog on dental implants. I’m going to be lazy and link the same video below but I do think this explains how to use the floss better than words ever could. Generally this floss is FIDDLY but once you get the hand of it you’ll be flying. You thread the floss through the space between the crown and the gum or the bridge and the gum like a shoelace, you then move the thick spongy blue section of the floss right under the margin of the crown and right underneath that bridge - remember the bridge is just floating on top of the gum. Now this can freak people out a wee bit, it looks like you shouldn’t be able to do this or its not allowed but I promise its ok. XFloss is on the pricer side, i’ll leave an amazon link for it here, I like it because I feel it works the best and I get the best feedback about this particular one from my patients. Curaprox and Oral B also make similar cheaper products which I’ll link too.

This method is not for everyone but fear not because the XFloss haters (and there are a few) out there we have the water flosser.

plaque search tip cleaning the (implant) crown

Water flossers again can take some practice but they are really excellent for cleaning all the areas of your mouth especially dental crowns and bridges. Again, I have a whole blog post dedicated to this which I will link here but I’ll go over the highlights and link a video too my favourite is the Waterpik Cordless Advanced Waterflosser but you can get various others at lots of different price points, pick one that’s in your budget.

A plaque seeker tip is probably the best option for dental crowns and bridges because it will agitate the gum line helping to remove plaque around the margin or the crown and underneath the bridge along with the pulsating water, but if you don’t have or can’t get a plaque search tip the regular water flosser jet tip is fine.

So hopefully this is a nice clear recap of what we have discussed at your appointment today or a little refresher to keep you motivated :) you’ll notice I haven’t included interdental brushes here, fine for most areas of you mouth and in between natural teeth, I feel that they just don’t clean crowns effectively right under the margin and can still leave some plaque behind. Of course if you wanted a big massive gold star you could use a single tufted brush around the margins around your crowns I’ll link some more information about these here. Thanks for reading and happy cleaning!