Yesterday afternoon my daughter fell into the railing of a boat and smashed her mouth. One of her front teeth is broken completely off, and the other has a diagonal crack in it. When I took her into the dentist this morning, he said that he will not have room in his schedule to fix it for at least another three weeks! He says that the root of her tooth needs time to heal and get less sensitive, so we would have to wait anyway.
Is this standard procedure in cases like this? I’ve never heard of having to wait this long to get a tooth fixed, and want to try and find a different dentist. We were able to save the piece of the tooth that broke off, and it seems to me that we should have that put back in place as soon as possible. My husband wants to wait like our dentist says, but is open to a second opinion. What should we do?
Shannon in Missouri
Dear Shannon,
There is no medical reason to wait. And yes, you should have that piece of her tooth put back in place as soon as you can. You should seek the services of an expert cosmetic dentist to complete these procedures. This is a challenging situation cosmetically, and you want both teeth to look good and to match each other.
You don’t say how old your daughter is, and that will help determine her treatment. If she is younger, the dentist may use dental bonding until her teeth are fully erupted. If she is older, he may chose to use dental crowns to protect the remaining tooth structure.