Whether your child is due for their very first trip to the dentist (this should happen by their first birthday) or you’re looking for a new pediatric dentist, it’s worth putting in the effort to schedule an appointment. High-quality dental care sets your child up for a lifetime of oral health. If you want to build good habits and deploy preventive measures to protect their smile, the right team can help.
Here at Happy Teeth Children’s Dentistry in Riverside, California, Irene Zaki, DDS, and our staff want to do all that and more. When you visit our office for pediatric dental care, Dr. Zaki and our team come alongside you and your child. Our goal is to deliver all of the following benefits.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends starting good oral health habits early — from the time your baby’s first tooth shows up. This way, as your child gets older, things like brushing their teeth right before bed and visiting the dentist twice a year feel comfortable and easy.
Getting your child into an oral health routine now builds good habits and ensures that those habits best serve their teeth and gums.
At our office, for example, Dr. Zaki teaches them how to brush their teeth properly. She can also share tips with you to make it easier to monitor their brushing at home. This way, they’re not just ticking the box of toothbrushing. They’re actually doing it right, helping to keep their teeth as healthy as possible.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that more than half of kids ages 6–8 and ages 12–19 have a cavity.
If you don’t want your child to be a part of that statistic, regular check-ins with Dr. Zaki go a long way. She can evaluate their teeth and gums at their twice-yearly appointments and identify areas that might need more care. For example, if your child isn’t brushing their back molars well, she works with you to develop a plan to limit their risk of cavities there.
On that note, Dr. Zaki has preventive dentistry techniques she can use to help keep your child’s mouth healthy. With sealants, for example, she can prevent bacteria from getting stuck in the grooves of your child’s molars, lowering their risk for tooth decay.
Similarly, with noninvasive silver diamine fluoride (SDF) treatments, she can fight against harmful bacteria in your child’s mouth.
If your child feels nervous about visiting the dentist, we have two ways to help.
First, regularly visiting our caring team creates familiarity and helps to build your child’s comfort level. Each time your child visits us and sees that we want to help them, not hurt them, they should be able to feel more relaxed.
Secondly, we offer sedation dentistry. If your child’s anxiousness makes their visit to our office stressful and fear-inducing, we can explore using safe nitrous oxide to help them feel at ease.
Ultimately, we want to be your partner in supporting your child’s oral health. To reap these benefits for your family, call us at Happy Teeth Children’s Dentistry or book your visit online today.
