Dental |
| Q: Why do veterinarians charge so much to clean teeth? Some of the places that do grooming include teeth cleaning with the grooming. What is the difference? Why is it important? A: While a good number of grooming facilities are promoting "teeth cleaning" what they are actually doing (and documenting) is a tooth brushing. While brushing your pet's teeth is a very good thing to do it is totally ineffective if it is done only when your pet is groomed. Brushing should be done on a daily basis to have the best results. What veterinarians do is a thorough dental cleaning. We have ultrasonic or high-speed rotosonic cleaning instruments to remove the plaque and tartar. And we remove all of that material from the part of the teeth you can see and from under the gum-line as well. Then after a thorough inspection of the mouth the teeth are polished and a fluoride treatment is applied. This will cost about the same as it does to have your teeth cleaned at your dentist's office. The major difference and the part that costs the most, is the anesthesia involved. To perform the thorough cleaning I described the pet must be anesthetized. We would be doing a great disservice in trying to clean the teeth in any other way. Dental or oral health is extremely important to the overall health of the pet (and the pet's person). Left untreated, mild tartar and gingivitis will progress to severe periodontal disease which can be the major contributing factor to heart disease, kidney and liver disease and many other infectious problems. |
