Dental Month http://www.highplainsvet.com/ask-the-vet/dentals/dental-month Dental Month             February is national Dental month, and that applies to pets as well as to people.  This is the time of year when we call attention to our pets pearly whites, or smelly browns as the case may be.             So what condition are your pet’s teeth in?  Many people have no idea simply because they have never looked.   Admittedly, grabbing your cat by the face and peeling her lips up and back to inspect all the teeth all the way to the back of the mouth can be a challenging task, but what you see might enlighten you.  That stench that causes your eyes to water when Fifi sits on your lap and pants while staring lovingly up into your eyes may not just be “dog breath”  it may be rotten teeth, so pull back those lips and take a gander.             Healthy teeth are white and the gums are pink and smooth against the crown.  Most dogs and cats start accumulating tartar on the crowns of the teeth by about 2 years of age.  As tartar accumulates the teeth become more and more brown and the gums start to become red and puffy.  Eventually a stinky grey line of pus forms between the gums and the teeth.  As dental disease progresses the infection works its way down to the tooth roots and loosens them up.  If you can poke a tooth with your finger and it moves in the socket it is extremely infected and needs to be removed.              If you are currently smugly thinking to yourself “Well my pets only eat dry food so there is no way they could have dental problems.” you might want to think again.  What we feed our pets has almost nothing to do with the status of their dental health.  Factors such as the shape of their mouth, the composition of their saliva,  genetic tendency toward problems, damage to teeth, and dental maintenance on the part of the owners are the real factors that affect the progression of dental disease.  If you didn’t brush your teeth for eight years you shouldn’t be shocked if you happen to develop some dental problems even if you ate crunchy carrots every day.             The goal of good dental care for our pets is to deal with the teeth before they are swinging from strands of pus so that we can keep them instead of having to extract them.  Every annual wellness exam that every pet should have will include a dental exam.  Your veterinarian will start recommending dental cleanings before the teeth hit the disaster zone if they can.             A good dental cleaning involves general anesthesia, ultrasonic scaling of the crowns of the teeth and under the gums, and polishing.  While the pet is asleep a thorough evaluation of each tooth can be made and diagnostics like x-rays, and appropriate treatment can be instituted  as needed for each one.  Unsalvagable teeth are extracted so they do not continue to fester, showering the body with bacteria and causing pain.   None of this can be accomplished with anesthesia-free dentals where someone holds the pet down and scrapes the visible brown stuff off the crowns of the teeth. The teeth certainly look better after such a procedure, but none of the real issues in the mouth have been addressed, and having someone wrestle with your uncomprehending pet for forty minutes is not actually safer or more gentle than having them anesthetized for a procedure.             Most veterinarians offer discounts for dental work during the month of February, so if your veterinarian has been hounding you for years to get that mouth fixed and you have been cringing at the cost, at least you can get a bit of a break.  The real trick to not needing a monstrous dental procedure, however, is to get your pet’s teeth taken care of early and often.  Next time we will go over some things you can do at home to reduce or avoid dental work at your veterinarian’s.