Dentistry

Dentistry

We focus so much on dentistry because it is a mostly hidden, vastly under-rated disease.
Here are a few facts that you may be interested in:

• Dental disease can affect any species that has teeth.
• Dental disease affects around 75% of our adult patients, and often the owners are unaware their pet is affected.
• Dental disease is preventable.
• Dental disease can shorten a pet’s life by an average of 2.5 years
• Dental disease is a progressive and painful disease if left untreated.
• Dental disease can have a significant impact on the pet’s well-being and their relationship with the owner.

We offer dental consultations for your pet with one of our nurses, who will then assess their dental health and discuss with you our recommendations and our guarantees with regards to your pet’s dental treatment. We also check your pet’s teeth at every health check to ensure your pet’s mouth is not hiding disease.

If your pet does require dental work, there are different services we can offer depending on the severity of the dental disease:

Nurse dental prophy – This procedure is performed by one of our trained Veterinary Nurses who scales the tartar off your pet’s teeth and polishes them using human grade dentistry equipment, similar to what is done when you receive a scale and polish at the dentist. The cost of this procedure is greatly reduced to assist you in keeping your pet’s mouth healthy and is only available to pets who are under 7 with no dental disease process or other health concerns.

Vet dental prophy – This procedure is performed by a Veterinarian and is similar to a Nurse dental prophy but is available to those animals who are over 7 years of age, those who have mild to moderate dental disease or those pets who may have other health issues that need to be monitored by a Veterinarian before, during and after their procedure.

Oral radiographs – This procedure is performed by a Veterinarian and is similar to that of a normal radiographs but uses a special dental radiogrpah machine to be able to image teeth and their roots and is valuable with oral surgery where teeth may need to be removed.

Oral surgery – This procedure is performed by a Veterinarian and involves simple or surgical extractions of teeth, as well as a scale and polish of the remaining teeth. Procedures involving oral surgery can vary in cost depending on; the length of time needed to perform the surgery, materials used and any medications required.

For each of these procedures the patient is under general anaesthetic, this is essential to keep the patient immobile and so the patient does not feel pain during the procedures. We recommended pre-anaesthetic blood testing before these procedures to check the function of your pet’s internal organs before placing them under a general anaesthetic, this blood test is compulsory in all animals over 7 years of age.

Seven days after your pet has had a dental procedure performed we invite you to return with your pet for a complimentary dental recheck. During this recheck one of our qualified Veterinary Nurses will discuss home care with you so you can manage your pet’s teeth from home and hopefully minimise the chance of them having to have another dental procedure performed in the future.