As you use your floss, you should wind and rewind the floss around your fingers to ensure you get a clean piece between each tooth. Floss is used to clean between teeth and more importantly below the gumline. Floss reaches areas that your toothbrush can’t reach and cleans out the bacteria, plaque, and food particles from below the gumline. If you do not switch your floss between teeth, you are introducing the bacteria from one periodontal pocket into another. If you have any stage of gum disease, (and 75% of Americans do have gum disease in one stage or another) re-using your floss will increase the chances of spreading gum disease throughout your mouth. Even if your floss looks clean, there are most likely microscopic bacteria on it as this colorized image of used floss from a scanning electron microscope illustrates:
To begin with, it’s hard to believe that anyone would want to rinse and reuse a strand of floss. But apparently the idea has gained enough traction to be featured on the American Dental Association’s (ADA) website.
According to the ADA, reusing floss can have three potential problems. In addition to a general ickiness factor, old floss may:
1. Fray and unravel 2. Lose its effectiveness 3. Distribute bacteria to your mouth. 4. While none of these problems pose any serious threat to your oral health, if you’re going to take the time to floss, you might as well do it right. Please discard your floss after use.
By cleaning out hard-to-reach spaces between teeth, flossing once a day significantly decreases your chances of developing gum disease and tooth decay. There is no right or wrong time of the day to floss, as long as you’re doing a good job of it. Flossing right before you brush your teeth, however, may help the fluoride in your toothpaste reach between your teeth.
Flossing is critical to the health of your teeth and gums. It uniquely reaches places your toothbrush can’t to remove food particles, plaque and other bacteria between teeth and just under the gumline. However, a piece of floss is made to be used just once. If reused, it will begin to deteriorate and even worse — it can introduce old bacteria to your teeth and gums, undoing the work you just did! Reusing dental floss or a floss pick can also pick up new bacteria from wherever you happen to store it. Even if you plan on tossing a string of floss afterwards, be sure to use a fresh section of that floss for each pair of teeth.
Bottom line: it’s really not a good idea to reuse floss on your teeth and gums. Plus, floss is very inexpensive and lasts a long time, so it won’t save you a significant amount of money to keep using the same piece of floss over and over.
What if I wipe down my floss in between each tooth and then wipe it down completely after the use? I also floss before brushing so whatever bad bacteria a might reintroduce to my mouth will be washed out with brushing and rinsing. I would gladly use a fresh floss every day if companies that make/sell floss also supplied refills for little plastic containers containing the floss. It is extremely bad for our planet to toss those out. I use at least 2-4 per year per person. It is absolutely outrageous to keep doing this.