Dental Care
Good dental care should start when your pets are young. You should use dental wipes, a small pet size toothbrush or a finger cot toothbrush (only use animal toothpaste as people toothpaste is toxic to pets). You start brushing or wiping their front teeth first to get them used to it. You gradually work up to wiping or brushing the bigger teeth toward the back of the mouth until you can perform this procedure on all of your pet’s teeth every day.
Many pet owners do not get the chance to teach their pets that it is OK to have their teeth wiped or brushed. They adopt dogs or cats that are not used to the procedure and may find it hard to get their new pets used to the idea.
If your dog or cat has brown tartar on their teeth then their teeth need to be cleaned by a veterinary dental procedure in a veterinary hospital. You can get them used to having their teeth wiped or brushed before the procedure but the procedure will have to be done to remove the tartar. You may also notice that your dog or cat has very bad breath. This is the result of all that tartar sitting on your dog or cat's teeth. The odor comes from the billions of bacteria that live in the tartar. These bacteria get into your dog or cat's blood stream and cause damage to their immune system, liver, kidney, heart, joints and other organs inside their bodies (see below). All these bacteria have to be fought on a continuous basis by your pet's immune system. This means your pet is not at their best everyday that their teeth still have all that tartar on the teeth and under the gums.
If you are unsure about your pet’s dental status you can call our office to schedule an oral exam. The cost is only $25. Dr. Sprouse or Dr. Kashani can examine your pet’s mouth and teeth and explain what needs to be done to help your pet have better dental health. You will be given an estimate for the dental care your pet needs after the oral examination.
Good dental health is very important. The tartar on your pet’s teeth contains billions of bacteria. They enter your pet’s blood stream and travel to your pet’s heart, kidneys, liver; they travel everywhere in your pet's body. The bacteria cause infection in the heart valves (causing heart disease); the kidneys, the liver, the joints and can cause other problems in other areas of the body. So the tartar needs to be removed. The bacteria also cause bad breath, tooth root infections (abscesses in the bone around the tooth root) and terrible gum disease.
Of course it is a bit hard to try to remove tartar from your pet’s teeth as he or she is jumping around, playing, wagging his/her tail or jumping up on the counter top. That is why we use gentle, mild anesthesia to keep your pets from moving around, nipping us and so on while we are performing their dental work. We support their circulatory system and blood pressure by giving them intravenous fluids during their dental procedure. We also make sure it is OK to use anesthesia on your pets by running a blood panel prior to the procedure. Each pet receives a full physical examination the day of the dental procedure.
If your pet is under 7 years old we run a blood screen the day we perform the dental procedure. If your pet is 7 years old or older we run a special pre-anesthesia work up several days ahead of time. This special work up includes chest X-rays and a more complete blood panel and urinanalysis. We do this so that if your pet has any health problems we can find out about them and take care of them before we perform the dental procedure. Since our pets age much faster than we do their organ function can change from good to bad very quickly.
OUR DENTAL WORK INCLUDES THE FOLLOWING FOR ONE PRICE (except oral surgery):
We remove tartar from your pet’s teeth gently and carefully with an ultrasound scaler just like many human dentists do. We also polish them just like when you go to your dentist. We also take dental X-rays of all (full mouth X-rays) your pet’s teeth to make sure there are no cavities or fractured teeth. The dental X-rays of ALL of your pet's teeth are necessary because we cannot tell whether or not a tooth has a problem by just looking at the tooth. All we see is the crown of the tooth with our naked eyes. We are not able to see the roots of any tooth or the bone around the tooth with our naked eyes. If there are problems with your pet’s teeth Dr. Sprouse or Dr. Kashani will call you during the dental procedure to discuss the problems and the solutions to those problems. At that time they will discuss any extra cost with you. The veterinarians will then try to take care of all the problems during the dental procedure being done that day. However, if there are a lot of teeth that require oral surgery it may be necessary to STAGE your pet's dental work into a series of visits. We do this because it is not safe for your pet, no matter what their age, to be under anesthesia for the many hours it may take to fix all their tooth problems. When extensive work needs to be done on your pet’s teeth we may have to work on one part of your pet’s mouth that day, let them recover from the work that was done then do the next part of the work at a later date. Although this involves more than one anesthesia it is actually safer than keeping your pet under anesthesia for an exceedingly long period of time. This method is how the Veterinary Dental Specialists recommend we proceed when such extensive work is needed to be done on your pet's teeth. We will always give you an estimate for any additional work that needs to be done on your pet's teeth.
The dental work your pet needs usually only takes one day. Your pet comes to our hospital early in the morning (between 7 and 8 a.m.). You do not feed your pet breakfast that day (water is OK up to the time your pet comes to our hospital). We usually call you around 3 or 4 p.m. that day to let you know when your pet can go home. If your pet needs more extensive work on his/her teeth then we will call you during the procedure itself (while your pet is under anesthesia) to discuss what other work needs to be done to fix any problems we find. For this reason we need to be able to call you at any time during that day so we ask that you be able to answer your phone at any time that day.
Occasionally the veterinarians will find extensive damage to the teeth and gums once we take the dental X-rays. What we will do then is finish the cleaning portion of the dental procedure, call you and explain that your pet needs the additional services of the Veterinary Dental Specialist, Dr. Niemiec. We will wake your pet up and let you take him/her home when they have recovered from the anesthesia. This situation can occur from time to time because the only portions of your pet’s teeth visible to the naked eye are the crowns. We cannot see the roots until we take the dental X-rays.
If you have questions about your dog or cat’s teeth we encourage you to call us to schedule an ORAL EXAM appointment for your pet or to ask additional questions before you schedule the dental work. We always welcome any questions you might have.