Children’s Dentist: Steps to Prepare for Your Child’s First Visit to Our Dental Office

We treat families as a childrens dentist and can help yours to stay in excellent oral health.  To do so, we need to see you regularly for dental cleanings and examinations.  While most children do not visit the dentist until they get elementary age, we suggest bringing them in even sooner. Preparing for a first childrens dentist visit can be quite stressful for parents. Anytime a child has to see a medical professional, even if it is for routine or preventative care, parents tend to be anxious. With the additional stress that many adults themselves feel when visiting the dentist office, it can be quite nerve-wracking.

Their First Appointment to Our Dentist Office is the Most Important One

Here is something you will want to keep in mind as you prepare for your child’s first dentist visit. The very first time a child comes in to visit a childrens dentist, it can set the stage for how they perceive dentists for the rest of their life. Often the experience that they have in that initial encounter forms impressions that will stick with them throughout their childhood, and it could very well determine whether or not they visit the dentist as an adult. In other words, it is critical that we make this first visit one where they can build confidence, learn that the dental office is not a scary place and start to establish a dental care routine. To highlight the importance of this, of the 45% of Americans that do not visit the dentist regularly, a large portion cite childhood memories as the reason why they do not like visiting an oral health specialist. With that in mind, you should know that your children feed off your emotions. What you do before, during, and after the dental visit is going to leave an impression on them. Since you want this impression to be good, remember that this visit is about the child and not about your own anxiety. By making yourself appear calm, collected, and completely confident in the children’s dentist, you will elicit the same kind of emotional response from the child. If, on the other hand, they can sense your nervousness or anxiety, they are going to process this at a very base psychological level and convince themselves that there is something to fear at the dentist office.

The Benefits of Teamwork

A childrens dentist is trained and equipped to deal with a lot of questions and help satisfy a child’s natural curiosity. However, your child will probably have a lot of questions for you at home, so we strongly encourage parents to have a conversation with their children before they come in. The conversation can be as long or as short as your child’s age allows for. We encourage the use of positive, upbeat language that will have your child excited about coming in, and we also prefer that you leave the details to us. One of the things we do well is explain the dental procedures to your child in a non-threatening way so as not to build up their anxiety. Once at the clinic, you should take some time to go over your concerns, questions, and goals with the dentist so that they are on the same page as you. We can all work as a team to ensure that your children feel comfortable and relaxed when visiting our children’s dentist office.