One of my new patients told me one day that she use to hate coming to dentist because her previous dentist always talked about flossing. She told me she hated flossing, and consequently I made sure I talked about it too.

So why do so many dentists talk about flossing all the time?

Flossing helps to eliminate the decay causing bacteria between your teeth. In fact, flossing is the only method at this point that will do this effectively. Brushing cannot remove bacteria on its own. A Waterpik cannot do it alone. Your favourite tooth picks will not remove it either.

As mentioned in my previous articles, it requires the formation of biofilm (a.k.a plaque) for bacteria to start eating away tooth structure by causing cavities. The formation of this biofilm takes about 24 hours. Once it is formed, the bacteria will start utilizing sugars to burn energy and produce lactic acid which in turn dissolves hard enamel from the tooth by making holes. As the holes get bigger, so does your dental problem.

By cleaning out this biofilm by flossing, we can disrupt the formation.

According to recent data, only 10 percent of the population floss on a daily basis. The same data told us that out of those who floss daily, 90 percent keep their teeth all their life. By keeping your teeth, you can save a lot of time and costs that are being spent on dental treatment for tooth decay or tooth loss.

Hopefully now you will like flossing.