Help

My mum just got all her teeth out on Thursday (16). She has been told to keep the dentures in for at least 48 hours before she take them out.
I'm planning on taking them out and cleaning them tomorrow. Can you recommend some products. I assume something like steradent would be sufficient? Also How long she they be romoved for (hour or more)?

Lastly, although I have been cleaning her teeth (removing the blood etc). I've noticed a blood like film/gel appearing on her top dentures. I assume this is normal? I didn't want to clean this as I assume it's part of the healing process. She has the dentist later in the week. Will I just wait until they have a look.

Any help you could provide would be great.

Thanks a lot.

[Jerome Tsang, DDS]

You mom has gotten what we term as an immediate denture.  The care of an immediate denture is to wear the denture for 48 hours straight.  You may take the denture out to clean them but they must be placed back on afterwards because the tissue may swell after the extractions.  If the tissue swells, the dentures won't fit and she'll be left without anything to eat/smile/talk with until it swells down.

You may want to buy some over the counter products and you can discuss that with your dentist.  Personally, just brushing them with water at night and in the morning should be sufficient.  She should be taking them out at night to allow the tissue to "breathe" so to speak.  If you can imagine, a denture is much like a sock and you shouldn't be wearing those 24 hrs a day because fungus can grow underneath the denture.  The tissue under the denture is a nice, moist, dark environment to encourage that growth.

You can clean the dentures thoroughly and remove anything on it that resembles blood.  But be gentle in her mouth as you don't want to interfere with the healing process.  But you do want to clean it up a bit as being dirty isn't a good thing with healing either.