Emergency Services.
How we help better service you and your dental needs.
Emergency Dental
You plan your dental appointments twice a year, booking time with your dentist before you leave the clinic each time. You are a preventative maintenance champion, showing up each time to receive glowing reviews about the health of your teeth and gums. With this kind of commitment to oral health, you don’t need to spend a lot of time thinking about your next dental appointment – all you need to do is make healthy nutritional choices and keep up with your twice daily routine of brushing and flossing diligently, right?
While this is true for the most part, your dentist knows that accidents happen. That’s why we recommend that all of our patients get to know what to do in the event of a dental emergency. Just like any active activity we are participating in, you are most protected when you know what to do when something goes wrong. You likely know how to intervene if someone near you requires bandaging or first aid, but do you know what to do in the event of severe tooth pain or a tooth break, chip or knocked out tooth? Here is what you need to know about dental emergencies.
Stay Calm
The oral cavity is an area of your body that requires an abundance of blood flow. Keeping all your tissues and structures healthy requires a consistent flow of new blood to deliver necessary oxygen and minerals. This may seem like superfluous information until a dental emergency has you concerned that there is so much blood presenting from the source of the injury.
Where there is pain, trauma and blood, the most important thing to do first is to take a moment to get calm so that you can focus on what should be done as a next step. Remind yourself that dental injuries often appear to be worse than they are due to the blood coming from the wound.
Clean the Wound and Stop the Bleeding
No matter if you have lost a tooth, dislodged a tooth or are faced with a laceration, the first thing that should be done is to rinse the mouth very gently with clean water before applying pressure to the source of the blood in order to stop the bleed. We recommend a sterile gauze for this purpose, but in an emergency situation any clean material, like paper towel, will do the trick. Note that if there are tooth fragments present in the mouth, they should be removed and put aside until you can attend to them.
If your lips or tongue are cut, a medical doctor as well as a dentist can provide stitches. Proceed to the nearest available clinic. If you are faced with both tooth injury and lacerations, it can be helpful to have someone call the nearest dental clinic to describe the injury. Depending upon the severity of the dental injury your dentist may recommend coming in for an emergency appointment rather than seeing a medical clinic for treatment. If you are taking medication, such as blood thinners, that will compromise your ability to stop the bleeding, it is important to let your dentist or doctor know.
Get a Dazzling Smile At Morrison Centre
We look forward to providing you with quality dental care in Fort McMurray & surrounding area to ensure you have a healthy and happy smile for life! Please give us a call @ 780-743-3570 or request an appointment online.
All services performed by a general dentist.
Tooth Chips, Breaks and Knockouts
Once you have rinsed the mouth and applied pressure to stop the bleed, it is time to collect and rinse any tooth fragments or dislodged teeth. Do not scrub a dislodged tooth and handle it only by the tooth end (not the root end). Leave any debris that is clinging to the tooth in place and transfer it to a container of cold milk or the inside of your cheek for transport. In some cases, a tooth can be reinserted into the socket until you arrive at the dentist’s office. If you can get the tooth in, hold it in place with gentle pressure from closing your teeth together.
It is important to see a dentist within 30 minutes of a tooth knockout to provide the best likelihood of being able to keep the tooth. For this reason, we recommend seeing the first available dentist in your area even if that means not seeing your regular dentist.
Tooth Pain
Tooth pain that is not being managed by over the counter pain medications should be seen by a dentist for an emergency appointment. Severe tooth pain often indicates an infection in or around the tooth which must be seen in order to prevent the infection from killing the tooth or spreading to other tissues. Tooth pain may be severe, but it can resolve in a few minutes if the infection kills the nerve inside the tooth. You may not want to see a dentist if this occurs, but it is critical that you do in order to have the infection treated.
If you see a pustule forming on the gum tissue around the painful tooth, this is also an indication of infection. Do not drain the pustule, but it may rupture on its own. Keep a cold pack on the cheek until you can see a dentist for an emergency appointment but never apply heat to an infected tooth.
If you have questions about this or other services offered by our general dentists, contact our clinic today.
