Pet Dental Care

Your vet is your pet's dentist!  Have you taken them for a checkup lately?  Looking after your pet's teeth is one of the most important responsibilities of animal ownership.  Pets with bad teeth often suffer serious health problems such as gum disease, facial abscesses, and even kidney and heart disease.  Cairns Vet Clinic believes strongly in "prevention is better than cure".  You can protect your pet's teeth in a number of ways:

• Feed bones (make sure they are safe for your pet: see next post) from an early age
• Clean their teeth with a toothbrush (preferably daily)
• Get them checked every 6-12 months by your vet (more often if they have had problems in the past)
• Get your vet to scale your pet's once they have tartar or mild gingivitis.
• Attend to severe dental disease: eg. bad gingivitis and tartar (often indicating loose or rotten teeth), early to prevent problems spreading in the mouth.

Your vet can check your pet's teeth and advise you what sort of preventative care you should be doing.  Different breeds and individual dogs often need substantially different preventative care: your vet can advise you on this.