Homecare

We have found the easiest way to brush a youngster’s teeth is to:

• Sit on the floor or bed with your child’s head in your lap
• Have your child look up at you with his or her chin elevated
• Use just a wet toothbrush. No fluoridated toothpaste before age 3, so they are not choking on the bubbles.
• Angle the bristles into the gums at about a 45 degree angle using a circular motion
• Brush all cheek and tongue sides of upper and lower teeth
• Lastly, a quick back and forth scrub on the chewing surfaces

If your child’s teeth are touching one another they should also be flossed since the most common place for a cavity to form in a baby tooth is between the teeth. The most effective way to floss your child’s teeth is to:

• Again, have his or her head in your lap
• Take about a 12 inch piece of floss and wrap it around your middle fingers (most of it around one side and just enough on the other to get a good grip on it)
• Leave about four inches of floss between your two middle fingers and then place your index fingers on the floss about half an inch apart.
• Gently see-saw the floss through the contact, form a “C” shape around the side of one of the two teeth and rub up and down three or four times. If you are doing this properly, the floss will go under the gum a little bit
• Then wrap the floss the other way around the tooth next door and again rub up and down three or four times
• Pull the floss straight up and out through the contact
• Move to a clean spot on the length of floss and go to the next two teeth

When you are done brushing and flossing you can let your child sit up and brush his or her own teeth with a little bit of toothpaste on the brush. Many young children have not yet mastered the art of rinsing and/or spitting so you do want to limit the toothpaste to just a smear.