You may be surprised to learn that dental floss is actually key in keeping them white. Generally, when you think of teeth whitening procedures, you think of cosmetic bleaching and dental cleanings, but there is more to that than you know. Here is how dental floss helps you whiten and keep teeth white.

Scratch That Tartar

Tartar is a big problem when it comes to cleaning, whitening and maintaining the whiteness of teeth. To keep that tartar off your teeth, floss daily to help remove the food particles that end up becoming tartar. The floss also helps remove some surface tartar that is loose enough for your dental floss to scrape off. Less tartar means yellowing and discoloration of your teeth. While you cannot use the scraping tools a dentist uses to remove hardened tartar, you can scrape away food particles and soft tartar layers with the dental floss, thereby removing some of that yellow stuff from around the bases and sides of your teeth.

Keep Teeth Clean after a Cosmetic Bleaching

So if you decide to go get a cosmetic bleaching for your teeth anyway, then keeping them clean after the fact is a very big part of the success or failure of the entire procedure. If you maintain healthy gums with dental floss, guess what happens? Your gums deliver a healthy blood supply to your teeth, which in turn are able to build up their own immunity to some stains because the teeth are stronger, denser and lack all of the microscopic surface holes that allow stains to develop. Brushing helps remove any stains that get past the teeth's own defense systems, but if you use dental floss too, then you are helping your teeth build up an immunity, build density, remove the tartar and keep themselves clean. Then the effects of your teeth whitening procedure last much, much longer than if you brushed alone.

Dental Floss with Whitening Enhancements

Now, you can also purchase dental floss with whitening enhancements. There is a minute amount of peroxide lacing every strip of floss you pull from the roll, which means that your teeth receive an added boost of whitening power when you floss. The peroxide also helps destroy imperceptible infections and bacteria below the gum line, thereby doing triple duty when you use this product. Ask your dentist, one like Scott W. Murphy, D.M.D., P.A., how it can help keep your newly-whitened teeth white longer.

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