One of the most common questions patients have when they're undergoing dental implant surgery is how and if they should brush their teeth after the procedure. The following are six things to know about brushing teeth after you have dental implant surgery.  

You should discuss brushing with your dentist or oral surgeon before the procedure.

The number one source of information on how you should brush after surgery is your dentist or oral surgeon. Make sure you ask about brushing and follow your dentist's instructions after your new dental implants have been put in place. 

Your dentist may tell you to avoid brushing around the surgery site immediately after the procedure.

Generally, patients are advised to brush around the surgery site. However, they can also brush areas of their mouth normally that haven't been impacted by surgery. 

Dentists and oral surgeons typically advise patients not to chew using any newly placed dental implants immediately after surgery to prevent food particles from building up around a healing surgery site.

Dentists sometimes recommend using mouthwash rather than brushing on the affected site immediately after surgery.

Usually, dentists will recommend or possibly even provide a prescription for an antibacterial mouth rinse to use on the surgery site for the first few days. This can help keep the surgery site clean and prevent infection until the area has healed enough to tolerate brushing again. 

It's important to use brushing to keep the mouth as clean as possible after dental implant surgery.

While you need to take care and be gentle while brushing after surgery, keeping the mouth clean while recovering from dental implant surgery is very important to avoid infection. For this reason, it's important to start brushing normally again as soon as you can comfortably do so after surgery. 

Using a brush with soft bristles is important while recovering.

Toothbrushes usually come in hard, medium, or soft bristle varieties. Your dentist may recommend that you get a soft bristle toothbrush so that you can more gently brush while you're recovering from implant surgery.

You should be able to brush normally after about a week has passed.

It usually takes about a week for the mouth to heal up enough for a patient to resume normal brushing. However, this can vary among patients. As such, patients should pay attention to the surgery site while healing from the dental implant surgery procedure. If they notice excessive bleeding or discomfort while brushing after a week or so has passed, they should discuss this with their dentist or oral surgeon. 

Contact a dentist for more information regarding dental implants.

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