What Is a Dentist Doctor?

What Is a Dentist Doctor?

Dentists are medical doctors specializing in oral and jaw diseases. With doctoral degrees under their belts, dentists are commonly known as "doctors." Most dentists will have either "DDS" or "DMD" added after their names to indicate their credentials as such.

As with medical doctors, dentists also oversee patient health in terms of overall wellbeing. They diagnose and perform surgeries. Due to the strong links between medical issues and oral health conditions, dentists have the skills needed to spot early symptoms in oral healthcare issues in a timely fashion.

Preventive Care

Dentists are trained to offer treatment, advice and dental work designed to prevent oral health problems. For instance, they might recommend fluoride treatments for early tooth decay prevention, or prescribe probiotics and diet modifications to manage an imbalanced microbiome.

Good oral hygiene can help decrease health complications associated with chronic medical conditions like diabetes and osteoporosis, and may even lower your risk of heart disease.

Preventive care is often prioritized within dental insurance plans, including regular visits for cleanings, X-rays and more. Some plans even offer full dentist jeddah coverage without any deductible or copay; other policies may limit coverage up to an annual maximum; check your policy to learn more!

Diagnosis

Dentist doctors undergo years of postgraduate education, and are well versed in how oral health impacts overall systemic wellness. Therefore, they can often detect early warning signs for larger health concerns like diabetes, osteoporosis or heart disease.

They can recognize and assess a range of lesions affecting soft tissues in the mouth such as oral cancer, lichen planus, candidiasis, white sponge naevus, hairy leukoplakia and morsicatio. Furthermore, they can palpate neck lymph nodes for any signs of malignancy during cancer therapy treatments.

However, it seems unlikely that one clinician could offer a provisional clinical diagnosis of squamous cell carcinoma or another cancer when presented with a patient with white lesions in their mouth; only someone familiar with all forms of mucosal lesions could make such a definitive call; unfortunately this is unlikely among most medical doctors.

Treatment

Dentists provide treatment and education on dental hygiene practices to promote good dental health and prevent disease. A dentist can restore damaged teeth with fillings or crowns; remove cysts, tumors and lesions in the mouth/jaw; perform surgery on gums/hard and soft tissues of head/neck; as well as perform procedures on teeth with fillings and crowns to replace lost ones.

Dentists typically hold either a Doctorate of Medical Dentistry (DMD) or Dental and Craniofacial Sciences (DDS), both doctoral degrees that specialize in oral health. As graduates, they possess an in-depth knowledge of anatomy and diseases that affect the mouth, jaws and surrounding structures; screening for potential diseases that affect other parts of the body just like medical doctors do; as well as screening for any disease in their head or neck that could impact it all the same way a DMD does in oral health; physicians require more training before becoming specialists than dentists do since physicians specialize in all areas of human anatomy rather than just oral health.

Monitoring

Orthodontists now offer dental monitoring as an innovative new service to track patients' Invisalign treatment from home. Patients download an orthodontic app onto their phone and send photos via its chat feature directly to the clinic for monitoring purposes.

This allows orthodontists to monitor progress, address any potential issues as soon as they arise, and schedule appointments accordingly. In the past, any issues would need to wait until an appointment was scheduled before being discovered - which significantly prolonged treatment.

This app also allows patients to send videos of their smile, helping the orthodontist identify any potential issues. Furthermore, its photo morphing technology enables orthodontists to visualize treatment progress on screen - this can give patients a clearer picture of their own progress while encouraging involvement with treatment plans.