How to Recognise and Prevent Dental Disease

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When talking about Dental Disease in cats and dogs we often get asked if we have any tips on how owners can help their pet’s dental hygiene. While your pet may still need a professional scale and polish at least once in their life, we’ve complied a simple list of things you can do at home, that should set them on the right track to having an overall healthy mouth!

 

1. Daily Brushing – As strange as it may sound, your pet just like us needs their teeth brushed! While some dry foods may help to clean your pets teeth, daily brushing is the best way to guarantee clean, healthy teeth! If your pet isn’t used to this we suggest you take is slowly, start by gradually getting your pet used to you touching their mouth and teeth then work your way up to brushing.  Remember to use a safe pet toothpaste, never use human toothpaste, as this can be harmful to your pet if ingested.

 

2. Implement a Veterinary Prescription Dental Diet  - Most Major food brands for both cats and dogs have put a lot of researching into developing specific diets to help prevent dental disease. These diets have kibble specifically designed in shape, size and texture to remove plaque and tartar. They also add various nutrients into their prescription diets that can help reduce plaque and tartar. 

 

3. Use Dental Health Products – Products such as OraVet Daily chews or Healthy Mouth can be used in conjunction with the above recommendations to improve your pet’s dental hygiene. OraVet is a daily dental chew which dislodges plaque and helps protect against harmful bacteria. Healthy Mouth is essentially a mouth wash that your pets can drink, just add it to your pets normal drinking water! It helps by safely cleaning teeth and gums, reducing bacteria, and is safe for both cats and dogs. 

 

4. Annual Checkups – Lastly see your vet at least once yearly to confirm your pet is on the right track to having a healthy mouth! 

 

Our pets aren’t able to verbally communicate with us in the same way we can with our doctors so it’s our duty to pick up the signals they might be trying to give us. To ensure your pet has the best possible health care, here are some subtle signs that might indicate your pet needs some form of oral care.

 

1. Bad Breath – If you’re unable to check and visually see inside your pets mouth, smelling their breath is the next best thing. A lot of the time if your pet has bad breath it indicates there is something going wrong whether it be with the teeth, gums or both!

 

2. Pain – If your pet has any pain when touching its jaw or mouth it could indicate that it is possibly suffering from some form of Dental Disease - Best to book in an appointment to see us, so we can get to the bottom of whats causing your pet pain.

 

3. Reluctancy to Eat – Although this could also be the symptom of another issue, reluctance to eat can sometimes be from Dental Disease, best to let us check your pet out to ensure they are back to their healthy selves in no time!