Not brushing often or long enough is the most common fault I see in most people’s oral hygiene routine. Softly brushing your teeth at least twice a day is recommended by the ADA.
With too much time between brushings, bacterial plaque will build up, boosting the risk of gum inflammation and other problems.
Brushing should last at least two minutes. Three minutes is even better! Obviously, the longer the toothbrush is in your mouth, the more plaque you will remove.
Most people fall short of both time lines. It’s an arbitrary number, but it’s just so people take the time to clean all the surfaces. I often recommend people divide the mouth into quadrants and spend 30 seconds a quadrant. Some electric toothbrushes include built-in timers.
To make the two minutes go faster, I tend to ‘multitask’, fitting in a little TV viewing as I brush! For kids, there are some great tooth brushing apps that have interactive songs to help keep the tooth brush in their mouths for longer. The Macleans Nurdle Time app is a crowd favourite.
