I stopped going to dentists in my mid 20s. Routine cleanings are not actually shown to improve outcomes, and the lack of cavities leaves me no other reason to go.
I couldn't say why I'm so lucky in this respect, but the bacterial explanation seems plausible.
Then you don’t know if you have cavities. Not all cavities are painful. Good luck.
You don’t know if you have cavities. I was similar. No issues so I stopped going for 15 years. Needed multiple fillings when I finally got a checkup, one of which was quite deep and has caused tonnes of issues since. If I’d gone regularly it would have been caught early. I wish I’d kept going when I had no issues so things would have been caught earlier. Cavity != pain a lot of the time. Typically when you get pain it’s a bad cavity which could have been caught sooner and treated more easily.
I got busy, then pandemic, next thing I know it's been like 7 years since I've seen a dentist. No problems or discomfort whatsoever. It occurred to me that bi annual cleanings are the SaaSification of dentistry, but I've never seen any real evidence.
There is some robust evidence indicating that routine plaque removal does not improve outcomes for cavity prevention or gingivitis [0].
Routine consultation with dentists otherwise may be beneficial, maybe not, but it hasn't really been studied much yet. The studies that exist are insufficient to form any conclusions. [1]
My post was downvoted by those who feel going to the dentist is important. I should state clearly avoiding the dentist should not be considered medical advice from me, and YMMV. I did the research myself and determined that routine dentistry was unlikely to improve my health outcomes, this is a personal decision that people should make on their own.
[0] https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD...
[1] https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD...
The cost of biannual dentist visits for life is huge across the entire population. I would have thought there was strong evidence for this a long time ago. If nothing else, I would have thought insurance companies would stop paying for the bi-annual visits if there wasn't good evidence it works.
Then again, maybe I'm giving insurance companies to much credit since they've been paying for acupuncture for decades.
i didn't go for a couple years and just had one of the worst experiences at a cleaning in quite some time. super painful, a lot of build up.
i haven't changed my brushing/flosing habits at all, but i did switch toothpastes to non-flouride.
now, i'm back on the 6 month schedule and back to flouride. i also switched to a tablet based toothpaste (tidalove). you chew it (don't swallow) and then brush. the pill has a bunch of other good stuff in it too. kind of neat cause it is also zero waste packaging.
