Ask the DoctorYour frequent dental questions answered

Gums bleed if they are swollen or inflamed even if they seem perfectly normal to you. Gums get swollen most commonly if there is plaque deposit or tartar that has formed below your gums. A simple professional tooth cleaning is sufficient to treat bleeding gums in most cases. In some percent of cases, deep cleaning/laser treatment of your gums might be advised. There is no home cure and the problem isnt going to go away. Kindly visit your dentist.

Are you speaking about pain during your dental treatment from your own experience or have you heard it somewhere? Dental treatment in general, including dental surgery and implants, is almost painless. Of course there might be a prick of the needle to anesthetise your tooth, but modern dental anesthetics are absolutely safe and they make your treatment painless. If any treatment that your dentist is doing is hurting you, you can request for an anesthetic any time. Dental treatment shouldn't hurt if done properly. Period.

I suggest you take an emergency dental appointment. It might be that you have a big cavity needing a root canal, a wisdom molar might be hurting you or you might have cracked a tooth.

The soreness or mild itchiness will disappear in a day. Your teeth might become slightly sensitive for a week or so, but keep them clean and it will go away on its own.

Gaps between teeth can be fixed chiefly by two ways - A. By braces/invisalign systems which will move your teeth over a period of 1-2 years into ideal positions to close the gaps. B. By veneers, which are highly esthetic 0.5 mm ceramic or tooth coloured cement layers that are bonded on to your teeth to close the gaps. Veneers are often done chairside in a single day, or fabricated in a lab, in which the process takes slightly longer.

Whiter teeth can be achieved by bleaching your teeth. Bleaching is a safe process using a mild bleaching gel on the teeth you want whitened along with often a specialised light that activates the gel to whiten your teeth. This is known as in-office bleach. This is often accompanied by home bleaching in which we give you special bleaching trays loaded with the gel that you have to use a few hours every night for a few nights till you are happy with the shade of the teeth.

Yes. For a while, upto a week, your teeth might become sensitive to cold water and food. A special desensitising gel is given to you along with the bleach to take care of this.

No. The bleaching results start disappearing after a couple of years in general - sooner for some people and may last longer for others. You can always get them bleached again! Permanent whitening is a gimmick. The only way to get pearly whites permanently with as little damage to your teeth as possible is by use of veneers on your teeth.

There are 3 ways to replace missing teeth:

• Removable dentures
• Fixed bridges
• Implants

Each has their own advantage and disadvantage. Removable dentures are inexpensive ways to replace teeth, and are mostly used as a temporary measure (as a great man, PI Branemark once said, No person should die with his teeth in a bowl of water!)

Fixed bridges involve slight reductions of the teeth adjacent to your missing tooth, and cementing or bonding of a bridge designed in the lab. Fixed bridges have been used successfully for more than half a century to replace teeth, and if done properly, are still an excellent way to replace missing teeth. The only disadvantage is your adjacent teeth need to be reduced a bit in size, and they might become sensitive temporarily.

Implants involve a titanium implant inserted in your bone through your gums, over which a crown is made. Implants have a documented 98.6% success rate in any region of your mouth, and they do not involve any major surgery. However, there are two limitations of implants - A. Like all good things in life, they are a bit expensive. B. They need good bone to work well. So it is better if you get your missing tooth replaced as soon as possible.