Rivers Family Dentistry Provides General Dentistry Services to Make You Smile

General dentistry is the most commonly provided services from Rivers Family Dentistry. This puts Rivers Family Dentistry in a unique position to provide you with care and help ease some of the anxieties you may have developed about visiting a dentist. Practitioners of general dentistry know that many people are afraid to visit the dentist and that this fear is widespread around the world. Here in the United States, there is an entire segment of the population, 26 percent, in fact, that will never visit the dentist unless it is an emergency, even though they admit to knowing that visiting the dentist can help them have better oral hygiene and health. Roughly between 9 percent and 20 percent of all Americans suffer from severe anxiety when it comes to the idea of general dentistry. An additionally large segment of patients we see have anxiety because it has been so long since they had an examination, they do not know what condition their teeth are in. Even more concerning for these patients, they do not know what remedies will be required to restore their teeth to perfect health.

General dentistry tips for overcoming your fear of dentistry

All of these are legitimate fears that seem very real to the person experiencing them, and as a provider of general dentistry services, we are well aware they cannot be talked away. However, over the years, Rivers Family Dentistry has learned that there are three steps a person can take to help them overcome these fears of dentist visits. Step number one is to identify what exactly you are afraid of. Some people are afraid of the tools we use being placed in their mouth, others are afraid of the loss of control, and still others are afraid of feeling pain or discomfort. The great thing about knowing what you are afraid of is that it takes this great big fear, pares it down into a manageable part, and then allows us to isolate it so we can work through or around it. When you know what you are afraid of, we can proceed to step two.

Step two involves education and demonstration. The more you understand what we do and how we do it, in addition to learning from us how safe and secure you are during any procedure, the less you will fear what is going on. Education is key to overcoming fear in general dentistry and in life. The third step is both the most difficult and the easiest. Rivers Family Dentistry tells people who are afraid of procedures that the best way to overcome a fear of dentistry is to make it a regular practice to see your dentist at least two times per year. When you come in for routine and often quick examinations and cleanings, it becomes a habit and shows you have nothing to fear from the dentist. It also builds a relationship of trust between you and your provider, so in the event that there is more intense work to be done, you already have that relationship to build on.