"Okay, so February is dental health month and one thing that we want to talk about today is how you can be helping with your pet’s oral health at home.
One of the best things we can do for dogs and cats is brushing their teeth on a regular basis, just like we do for our teeth which helps prevent plaque and tartar buildup that can start to cause issues below the gum line.
Brushing teeth on day one like how I'm going to do with Miles is really hard to do just from the get-go to just start with just shoving a toothbrush in their mouth and brushing.
But with lots of little work every day and little steps and making it a fun experience you can definitely get your dogs to be a pro like Miles, and maybe even your cats too! When you're first starting tooth brushing, the best thing that you need to do is figure out what is a good way to make this a positive experience. So definitely can try to see if your dog likes the taste of toothpaste. Miles loves his toothpaste. But you can even start using things like baby food or squeeze cheese, anything that they're going to like the taste of because it's really weird if someone walked up to you and just stuck something in your mouth.
And so, one of the best things to do is just get them used to even just having the toothbrush near their face. You can even stick it in their mouth, which would be awesome, but sometimes just having it next to their lips and getting them used to something sharp and pointy coming right at them.
Then eventually you will be able to work up to how Miles does where we can put the toothpaste on, and we can really brush his teeth. And so, brushing along the teeth, especially the front canines, but even to the back molars as well is going to be really important. Especially in little dogs, their back molars tend to get the most tarter.
Ideally, we can brush for a minute a day. Getting those teeth, getting the front of the teeth. That's going to be one of the best things we can do to help with that overall oral health and keep their mouth comfortable and pain-free and also keep their breath smelling nice and clean."
By Dr. Honeyford
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