A Mother’s Review of Listerine Agent Cool Blue Plaque-Detecting Rinse

Recently I was sitting in the waiting room of the dentist’s office doing what else but waiting. I was waiting for yet another one of my kids to have dental work and yes you guessed it cavities. All four of my children in fact had cavities; the likely culprit in this case was bad brushing. As I sat scanning Family Fun magazine for the umpteenth time a commercial on the waiting room caught my attention. The commercial was for a new product intended to help children brush better. The product was Listerine’s Agent Cool Blue Plaque-Detecting Rinse.

As soon as we left the dentist I hit the stores trying to find the product, alas it would be two weeks before I found it. Was it worth wait? Lets find out. We were only able to find the Glacier Mint flavored rinse. I imagine the bubble gum flavor is more popular and sells out faster. When we returned home the kids at once begged to try the new rinse. I agreed. The rinse comes in a plastic spill proof bottle. To dispense the rinse you squeeze the bottle and it squirts up a tube into the cup like bottle top. There is an easy to read measurement line so you get the perfect 10ml serving. If you only have one child using they bottle I guess they can use it right from the top of the bottle, since I have several children I put it in little cups for them. The ease and mess free dispensing is nice.

The directions now instruct the child to swish the rinse around in their mouth with out swallowing for thirty seconds. Thirty seconds is a long time to swish something in your mouth, especially if you are six. The child then can spit out the rinse and check out their teeth, which should now have blue, indicating places where they need to brush better. The kids reported that the flavor of the rinse was a bit strong and minty; I tried the rinse and found it to be a pleasant minty flavor much milder than adult Listerine products. Again I think kids would prefer the bubble gum flavor. When the child spits you will want to be sure they have good aim and you do not have plush white towels and carpeting in the bathroom.

I have not had a problem with anything being stained with this product but it looks like it has potential to stain if it got on something and sat too long. I must at this point report the one problem with this product, I am not sure the dye sticks to the teeth long enough to really do what it is intended to do. The tint it left on my kids and my own teeth was very pale even in the places where the plaque was it was pale. Now maybe this has something to do with my children all having recently had dental cleanings and my own thorough brushing habits, I can not be sure but I can tell you the color is gone as soon as water and tooth brush even lightly graze the colored area.

I can proclaim that with the use my children’s dentist did comment that he could tell that there was some real good brushing going on. I also have to say that I like the fact that this rinse freshens the kids’ breath and gets them excited about brushing their teeth. Anything that kids excited about brushing gets an A+ in my book.