What is Periodontal Disease?
Just like people, dogs and cats can develop periodontal disease, one of the most common dental conditions affecting pets. It occurs when plaque—a sticky layer of bacteria—accumulates on the teeth and hardens into tartar. Over time, this buildup can irritate the gums and lead to inflammation known as gingivitis. Without treatment, the infection can progress below the gumline, damaging the tooth roots and surrounding tissues and eventually causing teeth to loosen or decay.
Common signs of periodontal disease include:
- Bad breath
- Loose teeth
- Sensitivity around the face
- Excessive drooling
- Bleeding from the mouth
- Dropping food
- Weight loss
Just like people, dogs and cats can develop periodontal disease, one of the most common dental conditions affecting pets. It occurs when plaque—a sticky layer of bacteria—accumulates on the teeth and hardens into tartar. Over time, this buildup can irritate the gums and lead to inflammation known as gingivitis. Without treatment, the infection can progress below the gumline, damaging the tooth roots and surrounding tissues and eventually causing teeth to loosen or decay.
Common signs of periodontal disease include:
- Bad breath
- Loose teeth
- Sensitivity around the face
- Excessive drooling
- Bleeding from the mouth
- Dropping food
- Weight loss
How to Prevent Periodontal Disease in Your Pet
Preventing periodontal disease starts with consistent dental care at home, including daily tooth brushing, dental diets, dental chews, and other products designed to reduce plaque and tartar buildup. Even with regular at-home care, your pet may still develop tartar or gum inflammation that requires a professional dental cleaning under general anesthesia. During routine wellness visits and other appointments, our veterinary team will assess your pet’s oral health and recommend treatment when needed to help keep dental disease from progressing.
Treating Periodontal Disease in Dogs & Cats
Treatment for moderate to severe periodontal disease may involve:
- Placing the patient under general anesthesia
- Cleaning each tooth surface
- Taking dental X-rays to elevate oral health below the gum line
- Probing for problems below the gum line (cavities, root exposure, and so on)
- If necessary, extracting teeth if there's sufficient damage from disease to warrant it
Frequently Asked Questions About Cat & Dog Teeth Cleaning
Dogs and cats benefit from regular professional teeth cleanings just as people do, but veterinary dental procedures require special care and a thorough approach. Below, you can learn more about cat and dog teeth cleanings at our hospital, including what to expect and how our veterinary team performs each procedure.
Veterinary dentistry is very similar to human dentistry. Both require patients to keep still for dental X-rays and to endure high-pitched, high-speed instruments that scrape and polish teeth and clean under the gumline – procedures that no cat or dog will tolerate while awake (which can be difficult for some people, too). General anesthesia allows our patients to sleep through the procedure while we do whatever is warranted (including removing any damaged teeth) safely, properly, and without causing your pet undue distress.
We do everything we can to ensure your pet’s safety: a full physical exam prior to anesthesia, a review of blood work and medical history, anesthetic protocols tailored to your pet, and intravenous fluids and close monitoring during and after the procedure.
Dental X-rays (radiographs) are the only way to evaluate what’s going on below your pet’s gum line. They allow us to:
- See if there’s enough bone loss and damage to a root to warrant removing a tooth
- Identify any risks associated with an extraction
- Determine whether a missing tooth is truly missing or simply failed to erupt; the latter can lead to the development of a cyst (fluid-filled sac) around the tooth that can damage the jawbone if left unattended
- Confirm that an extraction was completed successfully (e.g., no root tips left behind)
We have two types of dental imaging systems: Digital radiography (DR) and computer radiography (CR) to give us the flexibility to choose the one most suited to your pet, be they a small cat or a Great Dane. Compared to traditional film X-rays, both DR and CR require significantly less radiation and produce a higher-quality image.
DR uses smaller plates on which images are projected, and is suited to small-to-medium-sized pets. CR provides larger plates and is more suited to large-to-giant-sized dogs. With CR, we don’t need as many plates to get a complete picture, which means less radiation and shorter anesthetic time for those breeds.
Ontario law prohibits anesthesia-free dentistry by non-veterinarians because it’s a disservice to the pets receiving them. Lay people offering these cleanings get around the law by offering “cosmetic” cleanings. In other words, this is just a superficial scraping of the teeth. Cosmetic cleanings leave owners with a false impression about their pet’s oral health, and they set pets up for failure (dental disease progresses below the gum line unhindered, leading to oral discomfort and tooth loss).
“I couldn’t complement the team at Southeast Oakville Veterinary Hospital enough. They took exceptional care of my highly anxious and nervous dog, Rosie, and she felt at home the entire time. We took Rosie in for a dental exam and dental cleaning and we had an amazing experience with Dr. Iz and Dr. Derek – they were professional, caring and generous with their time and support. Rosie’s teeth look great and I would recommend all services offered by the clinic to anyone.”
Josh M.
“Dr. Peters and Dr. Yan did excellent work and gave the utmost care and compassion throughout the experience. Dr. Peters had examined my cat during the consultation and confirmed the need for the extraction, and identified further progression of the issue that would need to be addressed. This primed me for what Dr. Yan would end up explaining just ahead of the actual surgery: my cat unfortunately needed multiple teeth extracted. Not only was Dr. Yan patient as I processed the news and asked questions, but she was clear and informative on the risks of proceeding in various ways. I greatly appreciated her calling me once my cat had been x-rayed, and getting further updates as the day went on - and especially pictures, which was a beautifully thoughtful touch!”