27 Feb How Often Do Cats Need Professional Teeth Cleanings?
I get this question a lot from clients and friends. Cats are not little dogs, and they have a different subset of issues related to the mouth. I will review that and make not only my recommendation for how often cats should have professional teeth cleanings but also the AVDC recommendation.
Before I answer that question, I want to discuss a fallacy regarding diet and calculus/plaque formation. There is no statistical difference between a cat eating dry food versus wet food with regard to plaque and calculus formation. The only difference is between those VOHC-approved dental diets (www.vohc.org) and conventional dry food. Those foods do make a difference with what I just mentioned, however, they don’t make a difference regarding tooth resorption formation. As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t recommend a very hard chew for a cat that has existing tooth resorption as those hard foods may cause excessive oral pain and discomfort. Bottom line is before you select a VOHC-approved diet for your cat, consult your veterinary dental specialist ™ for advice.
Now, let’s get to the question at hand…how often does my cat require dental cleanings? The recommendation not only by me but also my peers in the AVDC is at least annually. The reason for this is rather straight forward and simple. The biggest problem cats get regarding oral disease is tooth resorption (TR), and this is a disease process that is not that visible to the naked eye. It requires dental radiography and a keen eye to spot it. Recent studies indicate that over 50% of domestic shorthair cats have TR and this can only be diagnosed radiographically. Also, another study indicated that if there is tooth resorption on the mandibular 3rd premolar, other teeth can be involved over time. That is a bell-weather tooth for possible future pathology. Unless you’re Clark Kent, you won’t see this on physical exam.
Tooth resorption (TR) on the left mandibular 1st molar tooth. This was not noticed by the naked eye.
Another reason why we recommend annual anesthetic dental cleanings are to address early signs of gingivitis, early bone loss associated with gingivitis, and secondary bony reactions around canine teeth that called alveolar bone expansion. Each of these can start in as little as a few months so annual evaluation is prudent.
In addition, anesthetic cleanings/polishing and radiographs annually allow one to evaluate under the tongue and surrounding gingival tissue as tumors can occur in hard to evaluate places when the patient is awake. If you can identify a growth in its infancy, the ability to remove and establish clean margins is essential.
Therefore, the recommendation is annual professional teeth cleanings for cats. My recommendation is to dovetail this with your annual physical examination and wellness blood work. This blood work should be done annually anyway, so do that first, then make sure your pet has all systems within normal limits before undertaking anesthesia. For cats under 7 years of age, I recommend a CBC and serum chemistries. For cats over 7 years of age, CBC, serum chemistries, urinalysis and thyroid (T4). However, consult your family vet if you have any questions about what tests should be done, but these are our recommendations for referral to our office.
Images used under creative commons license – commercial use (02/27/2025) Photo by Chewy on Unsplash
Images used under creative commons license – commercial use (02/27/2025) Photo by Karin Kim on Unsplash