Geriatric Dentistry: Beautiful Teeth at Any Age

Geriatric dentistry is that branch of medicine which provides oral health care to older adults.

Seniors always confront themselves with more oral health related problems than a younger person, so this is why a special branch needs to offer these people all the care that they need.

Life expectancy in our days is much greater than it used to be several decades back. One reason for this growth is the advancement of medicine.

New diagnosis tools discover the diseases in much earlier stages, ands thus proper treatment can be provided in time. From an oral health point of view, the elderly suffer from age related teeth problems such as:

• Periodontal diseases
• Root carries
• Missing teeth
• Dentures that are ill fitting
• Oral ulceration
• Oral cancer
• Tooth decay (caries)

Many of these problems are present because the person did not take care of his/her own oral hygiene much earlier. Added to these are the bad eating habits that ruin the teeth and the health of the gums, and not respecting an oral health cleaning regimen (brushing + flossing), and of course the bad habits like smoking and drinking alcohol.

A geriatric dentist must be extremely patient, because he must be aware of the fact that an older person might be struggling with a much higher degree of anxiety than a younger patient.

Seniors are not used to all this modern day advanced technology tools that can be found in the dentistry offices. Therefore, the dentist might also have to kindly explain what each tool is used for and how it will be operated. This will automatically reduce the stress and anxiety levels in the elderly patients.

Then, unfortunately there are old people who struggle with extremely complex diseases such as dementia, Alzheimer’s, or Parkinson’s. Some of these diseases affect their mental abilities, and the dentist must know very well how he can treat such a patient, and how to help him not to perceive a dental treatment like a traumatic experience.

A few decades back oral education has been extremely poor, ands people were not giving that much importance to having a healthy set of teeth. This fact might also be yet another underlying factor for the poor state of the oral health in many elderly people.

The dentist that an elderly will go to must make him feel comfortable and show extreme patience during the treatment and while offering prevention/ education techniques and advices.