Today, life expectancy is longer than ever before. Many of us can expect to live active and vibrant lives well into our golden years. Through exercise and healthy living our bodies are able to help us continue to enjoy many of the activities that we love; although maybe at a slower pace!
As part of your health care team, we at Dr. Ian Gray Dental do our best to make sure your teeth and mouth can keep pace with your active lifestyle and not slow you down or get in the way.
By far, the most successful approach to ensure your teeth and mouth can keep up with your active lifestyle as you get older is
- Great home care with brushing and flossing
- Maintain you professional hygiene appointments - 3 to 4 month intervals is ideal
- Use a grinding appliance if recommended
- Be aware of how your medications can affect your mouth – individual recommendations will be helpful in many cases.
Many of our patients avoid having dental work done while they are younger for reasons of cost and time or are not motivated because many significant changes occur slowly over time and do not hurt, only to find that problems become magnified with age. Often at an older age it is difficult medically to have certain treatments or physically it is tough to be in the dental chair for extended time periods. Some patients will even reason that “I am too old to spend the money because I won’t be around long enough”. As a result, rather than being active and vibrant many patients suffer quietly and don’t enjoy life the way they could. Proper oral function including chewing, talking and smiling are vital for overall health and well-being. Without good nutrition it is easy to decline at an older age.
Our philosophy at Dr. Ian Gray Dental is to encourage our patients to work to make their mouth stable by the time they are 65yrs old. Our definition of stable is “to require very little dental work, if at all, other than maintenance “. This is entirely possible but does require some effort and planning.
If you think it is time to do some long term planning for your mouth please give us a call. Please also remember if you have an aging parent, sibling or other friend or relative that they may be great at getting to medical appointments while dental care is often forgotten. A great question to ask is when they last had their teeth and gums checked?
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