As part of your daily dental hygiene it is recommended that you floss at least once a day – though twice a day is preferable. That’s all well and good but in order to really ensure that your flossing is helping to remove plaque and bits of food that may be stuck between your teeth you need to use the proper technique.
Although there are differing opinions over what the proper technique should be, the prevailing one that is the most widely accepted consists of 4 simple steps:
- Wind about 18 inches of floss around one of your fingers where it feels comfortable (mostly the middle fingers are used), and pinch about a 2-inch length of floss between your thumb and middle finger.
- Guide the floss into the gaps between your teeth gently.
- Glide the floss back and forth between the teeth using a zigzag sort of motion.
- Slide the floss up and down between the sides of your teeth and the gums.
The reason why you’re going to need about 18 inches of floss is due to the fact that you should be using a clean stretch of floss for each individual tooth. After the first few times of flossing in this way you should become used to the length of floss that you require and can use that.
Try to avoid breaking the floss while you’re flossing your teeth. If for whatever reason the floss does snap it could indicate that you’re using a bit too much force – and that could damage your teeth and gums. Remember the proper technique is to ‘glide’ and ‘slide’ the floss gently and not force it through any movement.
To be thorough make sure that you floss each and every tooth through all the gaps that are between your teeth. It is easy to miss some out especially the first few times but once you get into the habit of doing so you’ll find that it really does come naturally. Some people even like to keep a count going as they floss so that they can keep track – but that’s largely up to you to find whatever routine you feel comfortable with.
As you can see it really isn’t that difficult to floss your teeth with the proper technique. Should you require any further advice t hen the Surrey dentist at Keppel Advanced Dentistry, 1 Cedar Rd, Sutton, Surrey, SM2 5DA should be able to help you out and provide you with a demonstration if need be.
By flossing regularly you should be able to avoid a lot of the common dental issues that people face, and it is really going to improve your dental hygiene tremendously.
