It’s winter and the ice can be such a menace to kids and their mouths (especially this year it seems). It’s a fear associated with being a parent of young children that they may fall and have an injury to their teeth, gums or face. But what do you do and who do you call for these types of emergencies? This is dental trauma and an emergency call to your pediatric dentist is in order.
Dental trauma doesn’t always mean a broken tooth. Accidents at home or at school, or during sports, are common especially in winter. Kids who fall or are hit on their faces almost always bleed in the mouth. This is because their teeth hit their own cheeks or bite the tongue or teeth may be loosened or knocked out.
Most parents would take their child to the emergency room. It’s almost instinct! But this isn’t always a good idea.
The emergency room can be full of sick people. As parents ourselves, we’d prefer not to expose kids unnecessarily to all those viruses and bacteria.
Emergency rooms have medical doctors with limited training in dental issues and the staff triage or prioritize real emergent cases: life-threatening or severe injuries. If it’s crowded when you go there, it’s easy to be overlooked. Facial lacerations are probably best addressed in the ER but most other dental trauma is best managed by our friendly and knowledgable pediatric dentists.
Go to the dentist for dental trauma instead
Call us when you need us and we can help assess if it is something that would be best handled in our office or if a trip to the emergency room is truly needed. Your pediatric dentist is trained to treat most mouth injuries in children and will be able to explain the after-effects of the injury during your visit. We will also provide consistent follow up care with the same doctor that originally saw the injury when it happened.
And, don’t forget to ask us about mouthguards for your little athletes.
Visit our Emergencies page for detailed information about each type of Dental Emergency.
We have a dentist on call after hours seven days a week for true emergencies that need to be addressed immediately. Should you need emergency care, and you are a patient of record, just call 586-286-0700 & you will be directed as to how to reach our doctor on call.
About Pediatric Dentistry and Orthodontic Specialists of Michigan, the offices of Drs. Plunkett, Ralstrom, Makowski, Thanasas, Ker, and Associates
Pediatric Dentistry and Orthodontic Specialists of Michigan have specialized in pediatric dentistry and orthodontics since 1968. Our family-friendly and newly renovated office gives patients and families a more comfortable and consistent experience with dentistry from the very beginning. Our pediatric dentists treat children from newborn to 18 years of age while our orthodontists provide care for both children and adults and are proud to be Premier Providers of Invisalign and Invisalign Teen services. The ability to treat all patients with compassion and individuality, including those that may have special needs reaches beyond our facility, which has treatment rooms available for children who require additional privacy and customized care options. We pioneered valued hospital affiliations to allow dental services to be performed at DMC Children’s Hospital and St. John Macomb Hospital, when appropriate or necessary, and our specialists are also proud to be on staff at Henry Ford and Beaumont hospitals.
