Hi! My name is Dr. Chris Maulik. I'm an Orthodontist in San Diego, California. So I'm going to go over the proper brushing technique with braces. What the most important thing to do when you're brushing with braces is time. Most people just spend 15 seconds, 20 seconds brushing and that's not going to do it. You need to brush for a solid 2 minutes. That's the most important thing.
Also, what people often do is they miss going above the braces when they're brushing. A lot of times they'll brush underneath the braces. What's important is that you get along the gum line; you have to brush along the gum line and spend a good amount of time, a good 30 seconds in this area, 30 seconds in this area, 30 seconds in this area and then repeat that and go on the inside, go on the outside, get on the lower. It's important to get all the parts of your teeth. People often neglect the back parts. It's important to brush the actual bands themselves.
Anything that you have inside of your mouth, any kind of hardware inside, feel free to brush it. If you have anything on the roof of your mouth, brush that. What's important, though, is that you get along the gum line and you angle your brush up towards the gum line so that when you're brushing, the bristles get up into your gums. You can do circular motion, you can do back and forth motion, either one, but the important part is that you spend the proper amount of time in each area, and you don't neglect any certain area.
Often people just brush right in the front thinking that's all they need to do, it's important to get in the back, as I said, you want to be able to get all parts of the braces and you go at any angle you can, whether you use a manual toothbrush or if you use a mechanical toothbrush as far as powered toothbrushes, it really doesn't matter, what's important is the amount of time and that you get all the different areas.
Now I'm going to go over the travel toothbrush. It's the same as a regular brush, it's just something that's in a case that you'll be able to take with you to different places. You pull it out, put it in like this. This way you can take it to school. You can take it when you go to friends' houses, different places, obviously, the same thing with this. You're going to make sure that you brush along your gum line and you want to brush for at least a good solid 2 minutes. That's the most important part. The travel toothbrush, again, take it wherever you need to; when you're finished with it, make sure to rinse it off with water and then put it away. That's the travel toothbrush.
Next, I'm going to cover the mouth mirror. The mouth mirror is something that you can get in many different pharmacy stores. The mouth mirror, what the importance of it is, is that, that way you can look in your mouth and make sure that you've covered all of your different areas, there is no areas that you've missed when you're brushing. This is also important if you have any kind of appliances you can look in and see if there is any food trapped anywhere or any areas of gum irritation. It's also good for if you have any kind of sharp poking things, you can look and find out where the problem is.
Next, I'm going to cover the proxy brush.
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