There can be several reasons that a tooth comes out of it’s socket prematurely. When a healthy tooth is knocked out due to trauma, it is often best to immediately replace the rinsed off tooth in it’s socket if you can determine it’s proper position, then hold it in place until you can get to the dentist.. If a natural tooth is preserved, one of our Drs. Of Smiles can affix that tooth to adjacent teeth and can many times help you avoid the necessity of more invasive procedures such as tooth replacement procedures like dental implants.
Preserving a Lost Tooth
If you lose a tooth due to trauma, the first thing to do is clean it off. Using cool or room temperature water, wash the tooth to help remove bacteria that it may have come into contact with. Once the tooth is clean, rinse your mouth with water to remove debris and bacteria from the tooth socket and push the tooth back into place. Hold it there if necessary while you call us for emergency dental care. We will do everything possible to get you in immediately so we can save your natural tooth.
If you can not get the tooth in the socket immediately or within a few minutes, do not let it dry out,, place your tooth in cold water or milk. This will help keep the tooth root moist and vital and may still enable one of our Mesa, Arizona dentists to place it back in place and have it stay. The sooner you can get to our office the better, but after 2 hours out of the socket, the success rate for reimplanting it drops off dramatically, so getting in to the dentist as quickly as possible is the key: ½ hour great results, 1 hour good results, 1 ½ hour fair to poor results, and 2+ hours poor success.
If you have lost a tooth in Phoenix, Mesa, Tempe, or Scottsdale, Arizona, please contact the offices of Scott Lesueur, D.D.S. & Charles Dodaro, D.D.S. as soon as possible to help preserve your natural tooth.
We are open 6 days a week, Monday through Saturday, with a doctor on call for after-hour emergencies.