What To Do In Your Child’s Dental Emergency
When a child has injured a tooth, treatment is crucial. Even if the injuries are minor, the risk of tooth decay and dental infection is still present. But we have tips for easing your child’s discomfort, and treatments for restoring the smile. In today’s blog, your Dallas, TX, pediatric dentist talks about our approach to emergency dentistry.
Common Examples of Dental Emergencies
Essentially, a dental emergency is any damage or injury to the teeth that isn’t life threatening and doesn’t require a visit to the emergency room. But these injuries do need attention to protect your child from complications like discomfort, tooth decay, or even dental infection, factors that could lead to discomfort or the loss of a tooth. Examples include a cracked or chipped tooth, a loose or knocked-out tooth, one that aches suddenly, or a situation in which there is an object caught between teeth that floss cannot remove. Our team can offer relief for these issues, but you can also take action to ease your child’s discomfort.
Easing Discomfort
Give is a call right away, even if the issue happens outside of normal business hours. We will arrange a time for your child to come in and undergo treatment. In the meantime, you can offer your little one an over-the-counter and age-appropriate pain reliever to ease discomfort. If there is an injury and bleeding, then you can stem this with a piece of gauze or cloth, and a cold compress to the side of the face could control facial swelling. If a tooth is chipped, see if you can recover any pieces and bring them with you. If not, repair is still possible! If a tooth is knocked out, then pick it up by the crown, never the root. Put it in a sealed container of milk or salt water and bring it with you.
Our Treatment Options
In some cases, we could use the same composite resin we employ as part of our lifelike fillings to repair minor damage in one visit. But we also have stainless steel and NuSmile zirconia dental crowns to address more severe injuries. We want to offer treatment so your little ones can avoid worsening pain, tooth decay, and infection, or avoid premature tooth loss that could increase the risk of misalignment down the road.
If you have any questions about our approach to treating dental emergencies, then contact our team today to learn more.
Speak With Your Dallas, TX, Pediatric Dentist About Emergency Treatment Options
If you would like to learn more about our emergency treatments, or to schedule an appointment for repairing your child’s smile, we invite you to contact your Dallas, TX pediatric dentist, Dr. Marr, by calling (214) 321-4880.
filed under: Dental Emergencies