You need to brush and floss regularly to protect your teeth. Harmful bacteria can spread and cause tooth decay. But did you know these same bacteria can hurt your gums as well?

If you have gum soreness or see some blood after brushing, you might have gum disease. This needs to be taken care of soon, as untreated gum disease can lead to drastic problems like losing your teeth.

Call our Winnipeg, MB dental office today at 204-977-8515 to schedule an appointment for gum disease treatment.

What Is Gum Disease?

Gum disease is a condition caused by harmful bacteria that live in your mouth. Don’t worry, everybody has them in their mouths.

These bacteria feed off tiny particles of food and drink that get trapped on your teeth and gums. They can eat anything you can, but they thrive on sugar. (That’s why candy and dessert is bad for your teeth.) As they grow, the produce an acid. When this happens on your teeth, you get cavities.

But when this happens on your gums, you get gum disease. It’s when harmful bacteria damage and eventually infect your gum tissue.

Gum disease can be broken into two stages: early and advanced.

  • Early gum disease is called gingivitis. The bacteria are damaging your gums, but they have not infected them yet. With gingivitis, you usually have some bleeding, tenderness, and halitosis or bad breath.
  • Advanced gum disease is called periodontitis. Here, those bacteria have gotten below the surface and truly infected your gum tissues. With periodontitis. You usually have bigger problems.

That’s why it’s important to get gum disease treatment as soon as you start seeing the signs.

Gum Disease Signs

Here are some of the signs that you might have gingivitis or periodontitis:

  • Discolored gums.
  • Bleeding after brushing and/or flossing.
  • Tender or swollen gums.
  • Halitosis (bad breath).
  • Loose teeth.
  • Receding gums.

If you have one or more of these signs, call us today at 204-977-8515 to schedule your next appointment for gum disease treatment.

Why Gum Disease Can Be A Major Problem

Gum disease usually starts out small. You could see a little blood after brushing but not much, and you might have bad breath on occasion. But here are some of the problems you can face if your gum disease is ignored for too long.

Gum disease can lead to losing your teeth.

As the bacteria damage and infect your gums, your gums start to recede from your teeth. This takes away some support teeth need to stay put. But your jawbone also starts to deteriorate when you have gum disease. Combined together, and gum disease can lead to some of your teeth falling out.

The infection that comes with gum disease can spread.

When your gum disease advanced to periodontitis, you have a bacterial infection in your gum tissue. This infection can easily slip into your bloodstream and get carried to other parts of your body. As your immune system fights it, you get problems with inflammation. But some bacteria can escape and infect your body elsewhere.

Gum disease can give you chronic halitosis.

With gingivitis, your gums are under attack by those bacteria — and losing. As gum tissue cells die off, you start to get a bad odor from your gums. Halitosis (or bad breath) like this can be chronic. You can brush and pop mints all you like, but it’s not going away until the gum disease is treated.

Gum Disease Treatments At Our Winnipeg Dental Office

At Lakewood Dental Centre, you can get two gum disease treatments:

Scaling and root planing: This deep cleaning treatment removes plaque, tartar, and bacteria from your gumline and below it. This can reduce irritation of your gums and help alleviate your gum disease.

Perio Protect: To fight the bacteria more directly, you can use Perio Protect. This system delivers antibacterial medication right on and below your gums. By taking care of the bacteria, you can take care of gum disease.

Call Lakewood Dental Centre today at 204-977-8515 or use our online form to make your appointment for gum disease treatment before those problems get much worse.