Toothpaste holds an inevitable place in our everyday life. Apart from simply cleaning your teeth, certain ingredients in the toothpaste help in appeasing the throbbing oral tissues at times. You have a wide range of options such as charcoal toothpaste, herbal toothpaste, salt toothpaste, and much more.
So it is pretty usual to get bewilderedness while choosing the toothpaste amongst the enormous brands and varieties. Do you agree?
If you had undergone such confusion, read this post. It is for people like you. Our dental doctors and oral hygienists have explained the tips to choose the right toothpaste.
What are the vital things you should consider while purchasing toothpaste?
1) Look for the IDA Seal
The IDA seal ensures the toothpaste’s quality & safety whilst it is a sign of acceptance as the product meets the standards set by the Indian Dental Association. The seal ensures that the oral hygiene product is safe and helps in improving your oral health without any irritations.
2) Fluoride Content
Dentists recommend that fluoridated toothpaste can reduce tooth decay to a great extent.
Fluoride is a naturally occurring mineral that feeds the nutritional elements to teeth and can reverse tooth decay in its initial stage. In simply, prefer toothpaste that contains added fluoride.
Note: As fluoride is quite abrasive, excessive use of toothpaste containing fluoride will damage the enamel. Hence adults should use a small amount of this toothpaste and a pea-sized amount is recommended for kids.
3) Tartar control compounds
Besides teeth stains, toothpaste tends to remove plaque build-ups that happen when food debris and oral bacteria collaborate with saliva to form a sticky substance. It deposits on teeth surfaces over the gum margin. Mostly, gum diseases begin with plaque & tartar buildup.
So oral hygienists recommend to check whether the toothpaste contains at least one of these compounds: Zinc Citrate, Sodium pyrophosphate, Sodium Hexametaphosphate. These compounds are powerful to prevent tartar and buildup from forming.
4) Take your medical conditions into account
Even though you have many varieties of toothpaste, such as whitening toothpaste, natural toothpaste, etc, you should take the undergoing oral treatment or chronic oral problems into account.
Here are a few instances:
- If you have teeth and gum sensitivity, choose Anti-sensitivity toothpaste because they contain desensitizing agents that lessen the sensitive pain.
- Choose Anti-gingivitis toothpaste if you found your mouth contains many disease-causing bacteria. It helps in preventing bacterial attacks on gums.
- Consult your dentist and purchase a non-abrasive denture cleaner if you wear denture teeth. This is because ordinary toothpaste contains abrasive agents and will damage the dentures.
- Typically, people who are undergoing orthodontic treatments (dental braces wearers) do not require any specialized toothpaste. However, it is best practice to consider your want to prefer the right cleaning agent if you are not aware of cleaning the teeth with braces properly.
5) Avoid toothpaste that contains Triclosan
Remember that more than 700 kinds of bacteria surviving in our mouths. Some of them are harmful whilst the rest also helps in keeping our teeth and gums strong. Evacuating the harmful bacteria with oral hygiene activities will balance the good and bad bacteria in your mouth.
Triclosan is an antibiotic found in some toothpaste, especially in anti-gingival toothpaste. This pulls away most of the bacteria including the helpful microbes.
Dentists found that extracting such helpful bacteria will lead to nutritional problems because those good bacteria are responsible for initiating the breakdown process of foods we consume.
Bottom line
Everyone prefers toothpaste with respect to their underlying oral problems and personal preferences. If you feel complicated to choose the right one, consult your dentist and get the best toothpaste as per his/her recommendations.
