What's the best way to check if a table exists in a Sql database in a database independant way?

I came up with:

       bool exists;
       const string sqlStatement = @"SELECT COUNT(*) FROM my_table";

       try
        {
           using (OdbcCommand cmd = new OdbcCommand(sqlStatement, myOdbcConnection))
           {
                cmd.ExecuteScalar();
                exists = true;
           }
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            exists = false;
        }

Is there a better way to do this? This method will not work when the connection to the database fails. I've found ways for Sybase, SQL server, Oracle but nothing that works for all databases.