Stopping the Rot
CONSUMING INTEREST By LESLIE ADRIAN MR NORMAN SrJOHN-
STEvAs has denounced the electric toothbrush, while Mr Bernard Levin has an- nounced publicly that he owns one. What conclu- sion one draws from this, 1 do not know, but a dental expert of my ac- quaintance assures me that a battery-operated auto- matic toothbrush gets teeth cleaner than any amount of grudging muscle power, because no one spends the mini- mal two minutes brushing his teeth that every dentist would advise. One snag: electric tooth- brushes do little or nothing for the gums, so users, even of the Ronson (which at only £4 19s. 6d. is, in the opinion of my expert, in no way inferior to the more costly models), should keep a manual brush handy for the occasional gum massage.
Apparently children are much more enthusi- astic about tedious dental hygiene when it involves an electrical gadget, and as the heads of these brushes are smaller than the ordinary ones, they are particularly suitable for young teeth. In any case, children should use inter- proximal brushes, not any old brush. These small-headed brushes, designed for unevenly spaced, growing teeth, can be bought from Boots, or, as the ads say, any good chemist.
Pursuing this tooth truth, I elicited further that the ideal brush to buy if, like Mr St John- Stevas, you can't abide the electrical, is the medium-hard, tufted nylon kind. Nylon is better than bristle, as well as cheaper, but harmful to teeth unless bound in bunches and not too hard. Wisdom and Pepsodent get a good report from dentists, unlike toothpowders, which are con- sidered abrasive, stinging pastes, which are too harsh, and fluoride, which does no harm but no good either. Dentists refrain from denouncing fluoride pastes becauses they fear that this would chase people into the anti-fluoridation-of-water camp, and they favour fluoridation which works from inside, not out.
Contrary to what I have read elsewhere, dentists appear to approve of most toothpastes, but for gum health they tend to recommend a soft powder with salt in it, like Selto. For sensi- tive mouths there are other special pastes, like Sensodyne and Emoform, but it is wise to talk to your own dentist about them. With more than half the population wearing false teeth of some sort, and more than a third with a com- plete set, it is more than time that a few of the myths and half-truths about dental care and caries were laid to rest. One fine day we may begin preventive dentistry in Britain where the second set of growing teeth are treated as they arrive and the lucky adolescent need never see the inside of a dental surgery again. Then we should really have stopped the rot.
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