The aim of a visit to the hygienist at Latchford and Latchford is to help you achieve a healthy mouth and the knowledge to maintain this health for the rest of your life. Appointments will be arranged to include time to discuss your personal needs.

The General Dental Council have relaxed regulations which now permit Dental Hygienists to work without referral from a Dentist, so that patients can book hygiene appointments without seeing one of our dentists. Dental Hygienists are able to carry out mouth care advice and scaling. They are not qualified in clinical examination that leads to a dental treatment plan so it is essential that all patients are regularly examined by a qualified Dental Surgeon to exclude dental disease such as caries and endodontic disease.

A full assessment of your mouth will be carried out at the beginning depending on the complexity of any problems. This involves taking a number of measurements of your teeth and gums to give us a complete picture in order to plan treatment. We will assess how well you currently clean your mouth and assess the level of bleeding.

A programme of care will be agreed which may involve a number of appointments. Your teeth will be thoroughly cleaned (scaled) to remove hard deposits and stain. Your tooth brushing will be assessed so that together we can find the most effective way for you to achieve and maintain health. Some of these scaling appointments may be carried out under local anaesthetic (a small injection to numb the teeth and gum). We can then offer a maintenance programme designed especially for you.

We also provide prevention advice for children to include tooth brush instruction, diet advice and provision of fluoride as advised by the dentist. We are happy to discuss any aspect of your whole dental treatment and liaise closely with your dentist.