The need for emergency care in Mount Waverley, VIC, can vary widely, but you'll be relieved to hear that they rarely become complicated medical emergencies. A recent study showed that less than one-tenth of one per cent of dental emergencies required hospital care or admissions over eight years. But while the seriousness of common dental emergencies may not be a matter of life and death, you can suffer significant impacts if unprepared for the most common incidents.
In Australia, emergency preparedness is a high priority. At Mount Waverley Smiles, our goal is many-faceted. First, we'll help you handle the most frequent conditions that patients experience, along with specific steps you should take. We also aim to help you distinguish how to respond to your kids versus adults. Lastly, we hope to emphasise the preventive care we offer to patients in Mount Waverley, VIC, so that many conditions which become urgent may be avoided.
What Is A Dental Emergency?
Determining if a specific instance should be treated as a dental emergency is tricky. While many people hope that someone else will tell them definitively, you may find it more helpful to start with what a specific instance requires. At the centre of our purposes is one necessary fact: a dental emergency needs immediate action.
For example, you may chip a tooth that looks weird but doesn't hurt or feel loose. So you'll want to do something about it, but it could wait for a regular appointment. But in cases of severe pain, swelling, or some types of bleeding mouth trauma, you will realise when treatment cannot be ignored or even delayed.
Common Dental Conditions and How to Stabilise Them
Now that we've determined that an indispensable aspect of a dental emergency is the need for quick action, you should be aware of a distinction between your first action, which are to stabilise the situation, and your second act, which is to call your emergency dentist to access their expertise to schedule the soonest possible appointment and plan a course of action.
Here are samples of more common dental conditions and how to stabilise them. Let's start with situations that are most frequently emergencies.
Bleeding Injury from trauma: If you've been in an accident and have injuries to facial bones or lacerations that bleed extensively, we recommend you contact a hospital emergency room or urgent care for treatments of fractures and stitches for severe cuts.
A knocked-out or avulsed tooth: For a permanent tooth that has been knocked out, usually due to trauma or some other injury, your tooth could be reimplanted if you take immediate action to preserve its living parts. If the tooth is found intact, you can stabilise the situation by following these steps:
- Touch only by the top; never touch the tooth root
- Gently remove debris, rinsing with warm water
- The first choice, place it back in the socket if you can
- Second, hold it between your cheek and gum
- Third, place it in a container, submerged in saliva or milk; never water
- Apply a cold compress to the area to slow bleeding
- Call your emergency dentist immediately
A severe toothache or gum pain: If you feel pain localised in a particular tooth or part of your gums, it's a good chance you're suffering from a tooth infection that has grown large enough to threaten your oral health. In these cases, you will want to look for symptoms associated with infections, such as:
- Swelling
- Visible sore on gums
- A sour taste in your mouth and bad breath
- General fever
Many dentists recommend treating a tooth infection as an emergency because infections may spread. The main threat is that if the condition moves into your throat, swelling may impact your airways, making it difficult to swallow and, in more advanced cases, breathe.
A fractured or broken tooth: a tooth may break due to acute trauma and chronic issues of which you may not even be aware. In these cases, your main goal is to prevent bacteria from getting in through the cracks and causing a root infection.
So if you have a broken tooth, start by rinsing your mouth with warm, mild saltwater to clean the tooth and lessen bacteria (salt has safe and gentle antibacterial qualities). Then call our dental clinic to determine what to do next.
Aching and bleeding gums: When your gums hurt and pain isn't associated with a particular tooth or teeth, you may have periodontal disease, more commonly known as gum disease, caused by a progressive gum infection. Infections that go untreated frequently become an overall health problem, so they should be treated sooner rather than later.
How Does Emergency Dental Care Differ for Children?
In most cases, your child's need for urgent dental care will centre around the acute impacts of accidental damage rather than chronic issues with infection. One of the main differences when treating kids is if the damaged or lost tooth is a baby tooth or a permanent tooth.
If the tooth is permanent, you should follow the stabilising steps outlined above so that your dentist has the best chance of saving it. However, if the tooth is a baby tooth, we will likely discourage reimplantation. Instead, we may use a space maintainer, which will keep the space open for the permanent tooth to occupy eventually.
Assemble a Dental First Aid Kit
Especially where your children are concerned, putting together a dental first aid kit is a great way to familiarise them with how you'll respond to a potential emergency. This gives both you and your children a place to start just in case and offers the opportunity to discuss what each item does.
This kit can include:
- Hot and cold compresses
- Antiseptic mouth rinse and a small cup
- Rolled gauze kept clean in a bag or container
- A small container with a sturdy cap
- Anti-inflammatory and over-the-counter pain reliever
We recommend you keep this kit so that all family members can access it when needed.
After Stabilising the Situation, Call our Mount Waverley Dental Clinic
Action is at the crux of emergency preparedness and response. So once you've taken the appropriate action to stabilise your and your child's condition, the next thing to do is call our dental clinic immediately. Be ready to report details like symptoms and pain severity during this call, along with how you've responded. Our experienced dentists can ask all the right questions so that we can devise a treatment plan and get you into our clinic as soon as possible.
Emergency Dentist and Urgent Dental Care in Mount Waverley
At Mount Waverley Smiles, our team rallies when you have a dental emergency. We invite you to contact our dental clinic to learn more and to take advantage of our general and preventive dental services to avoid what can be avoided and respond effectively whenever your family needs it.
