When Should My Cat Get Her Teeth Cleaned?

If you read our post on dog dental cleanings and thought “great, now do cats,” this one’s for you. The short answer is similar: most cats benefit from their first professional cleaning somewhere between two and four years of age, and after that we go by what we find at each exam. The longer answer is where cats get interesting, because cat mouths have a few problems that dogs mostly don’t, and cats are remarkably talented at not telling anyone.

Cats are professional pain-hiders

Dogs at least give you hints. They drop kibble, chew on one side, or breathe in your face until you notice. Cats treat dental pain as classified information. A cat with a badly infected tooth will often keep eating normally, keep grooming, and keep sleeping in her sunny spot, right up until the day she stops eating altogether and you’re left wondering what happened.

This is the main reason we don’t wait for symptoms with cats. By the time a cat shows you her mouth hurts, it has usually hurt for a long time.

The same plaque and tartar story, with a twist

Like dogs, cats build up plaque within hours, which hardens into tartar and drives inflammation under the gums. Left alone, this becomes periodontal disease: gum recession, bone loss, loose teeth. That part is the same across species.

Where cats differ is in two conditions that show up on top of the usual tartar problem.

Tooth resorption

This is the big one, and it’s extremely common. Somewhere between a quarter and half of adult cats will develop at least one resorptive lesion in their lifetime, and the odds go up with age. For reasons nobody has fully figured out, the cat’s own body starts dissolving the tooth, usually beginning at or below the gumline. Eventually the tooth structure is eaten away and the pulp inside, where the nerve lives, becomes exposed.

These are painful. Really painful. And the tricky part is that from the outside, a resorbing tooth can look like a tooth with a bit of gum growing up over it, or it can look completely normal. The only reliable way to find them is dental X-rays. A tooth with resorption can’t be saved, so treatment is extraction, and cats do beautifully once the source of pain is gone.

Gingivostomatitis

This one is less common but nastier. Some cats develop severe, widespread inflammation of the gums and the tissue in the back of the mouth, well beyond what the amount of tartar would explain. It looks like the cat’s immune system is overreacting to plaque, and the result is a mouth so sore that the cat may drool, paw at her face, or scream when she yawns.

Stomatitis often needs more than a cleaning. Many of these cats do best with extraction of the teeth behind the canines, and some need all of them out. That sounds dramatic, but cats without teeth eat just fine, and the difference in a stomatitis cat before and after treatment is one of the most rewarding things we see.

Young cats aren’t exempt

Kittens lose their baby teeth between roughly three and six months, and just like puppies, sometimes a baby tooth refuses to leave when the adult one arrives. We check for that at kitten visits and remove stragglers, usually alongside the spay or neuter.

Some cats also develop juvenile gingivitis, where the gums get red and puffy as the adult teeth come in, even without much tartar. Most of these cats grow out of it, but a few progress toward early periodontal disease or stomatitis, so we watch them a little closer during that first year or two.

What we look for at your cat’s exam

Every wellness visit at Prairie Animal Hospital includes a look in the mouth, or as much of a look as your cat is willing to grant us. We’re a Cat Friendly Certified practice, which means we’ve built our handling around keeping cats calm, and most cats tolerate a quick lip-lift better than you’d expect.

We’re grading tartar and gum redness like we do for dogs, but we’re also specifically checking for:

• Red gum tissue creeping up the side of a tooth (a common early sign of resorption)
• A missing tooth you didn’t know was missing
• Redness at the very back of the mouth
• Broken canine teeth, which happen more than people realize
• Any reluctance to let us near one side

If your cat has mild tartar and slightly pink gums, that’s the ideal time for a cleaning. If we’re seeing any of the items above, we’ll want to get her in sooner so we can X-ray and get ahead of it.

Why cats need anesthesia for this

There is no version of a thorough cat dental cleaning that happens on an awake cat. Cleaning under the gumline hurts, X-rays require a still patient with a sensor in the mouth, and a cat who has decided she’s done is very effective at communicating that. Anesthesia lets us do the whole job safely and without your cat associating the clinic with a fight.

Our cat dental procedures include pre-anesthetic bloodwork, a dedicated technician monitoring her throughout, full-mouth dental X-rays, scaling and polishing above and below the gumline, and my tooth-by-tooth exam. Most cats go home the same day and are back to being mildly annoyed with you by evening.

Home care for cats (it’s possible, really)

Brushing a cat’s teeth is not for the faint of heart, but plenty of cats accept it if you start young and go slowly. A finger brush and a poultry-flavored pet toothpaste help. If brushing is a firm no, dental diets and treats with the VOHC seal are the next best thing, and some cats will use a water additive without noticing.

Home care slows things down but doesn’t stop resorption, so even a well-brushed cat still needs those exams.

Signs that should move up the timeline

Call us if you notice any of these:

• Drooling, especially if it’s tinged with blood
• Chewing on one side or dropping food
• Pawing at the mouth or rubbing her face on things
• Bad breath (cat breath shouldn’t smell like much)
• Eating less, or preferring soft food suddenly
• Grooming less, which sometimes shows up as a scruffy coat before anything else

Any one of these is worth a look. Two or more means please don’t wait for the annual visit.

When to schedule

If your cat is over two and hasn’t had her mouth evaluated in the last year, book a wellness exam and we’ll tell you where she stands. If she’s showing any of the signs above, or you’ve just realized you have never actually seen inside her mouth, that’s fair, and it’s a good reason to come in.

You can request an appointment through our website or call the clinic. We’ll be gentle, we’ll be quick, and we’ll tell you the truth about what we find.