Mouth Care for Infants?

One brochure I brought home from the hospital mentioned that we should clean DC's mouth periodically (he's 3 weeks old), but it doesn't say how to do this, and I've never heard that we should do this elsewhere.

Does anyone clean their newborn's mouth? If so, how do you do it? TIA!

Re: Mouth Care for Infants?

I actually never did this at a young age, but I read that you can take a wet wash cloth and rub the babies gums down with them. It is supopsed to keep them clean and also help get them used to you going in their mouth and cleaning it at the same time.

I personally never did this --- however at a little before a year old, when she started to teeth, I got one of the finger toothbrushes that you fit over your pointer finger. It has very soft bristles and came with safe-to-swallow toothpaste, and I'd clean her gums/tooth buds with that.

I also had these different toothbrush type wands that were just plastic/rubber on the end with nubbies, no bristles, and I let her chew on them when she was teething.