Help! Half my tooth just fell out and I don't have a dentist!

[moosemama]

I haven't been to the dentist in a very looong time, am petrified of them.

I've known for a while that one of the teeth my childhood dentist did a hatchet job on had lost part of the filling and if a seed or anything got into the gap it hurt like hell.

Tonight I thought there was a seed in it so just put my nail onto the top to try and extract the seed and half my tooth fell out!

After a panic session I eventually tried calling the out of hours number for the dentist on our road and was put through to NHS direct. Apparently a dental nurse will be calling me within the hour to advise me where to go to get out of hours help.

The thing is, I am not in any pain unless I touch it or bite, but there have been a few loose bits of amalgam which I am concerned about swallowing. So, are they likely to tell me to wait and book an appointment with a local dentist on Monday, and bearing in mind I have a current Maternity exemption card, what is it likely to cost to get this sorted out.

I am assuming they will have to extract the tooth and I am absolutely terrified, the last time I went to a dentist the anaesthetic didn't work and I ended up thumping the dentist to make her stop. (That was 17 years ago!)

Any advice or experience would be appreciated.

[MaryBS]

I went through something similar, having lost most of a tooth. The dentist was able to build it up so it didn't have to be removed. After that I started going to the dentist again!

Then in August, I lost part of another tooth. Went back to same dentist (now independent and 20 miles away, but that's life) and he rebuilt that one too.

So, all is not lost!

[moosemama]

Oh thank you so much for giving me some hope.

So did you keep the bit that broke off and he rebuilt it using that piece?

They still haven't called back and I am getting more nervous about the whole thing by the minute.

[MaryBS]

No, didn't need the fallen out bit at all. I wondered that too, and had kept it. Don't think it would have been a lot of use tho'.

I'm petrified of the dentist too, if that helps

[slipperthief]

No idea if they'll use the broken bit but saw a poster in a waiting room saying pop fallen out teeth in milk to stop the root drying out.

And they can do some pretty good patch up jobs - half one of my molars is now gold moulding (which cost me nothing under mat exemption and more robust than amalgam).

I had a gaping hole down almost down to the root for a week and it was fine as long as I kept it clean.

[slipperthief]

And most dentists are lovely if you explain you're a bit scared of it all.

[moosemama]

That's interesting. I do have the piece that came out, its sort of a whole quarter of a back molar.

I have the same problem with the exact same tooth on the on the other side. A quarter of that one fell out years ago, but it has more actual tooth left and has never caused me any pain.

Both of them were filled by my childhood dentist to the extent that there wasn't much of the original teeth left. Apparently I didn't even have cavities - just dimples that had the potential to become cavities! The last time I went was to have the very same tooth/filling completed and I had to be seriously sedated after the anaesthetic failure the time before.

I just wish they would hurry up and call back as I'm working myself up into a right old flap about it. (Not like me at all, I'm usually calm in a crisis.)

[ChristieF]

Dentists can do miracles these days. Don't worry about your childhood dentist. They all have different personalities. There's no need to be in any pain. Just make sure you let them know if it hurts. To get a permanent dentist you need to phone your local Primary Care Trust. They operate the system overall. Look in the phone book.

[AMumInScotland]

When the dental nurse gets back to you, make sure she knows you are in pain when you touch it or bite - that all counts as "being in pain" even if it's not non-stop, since you aren;t going to manage without eating for days.

They are not likely to stick the broken piece back on - but very often they can rebuild it - they put a sort of plastic "belt" round your tooth and use lots of "filler" to make it back up to a normal tooth shape.

And anaesthetics have got way better in the last 17 years - they even have yucky clove-flavoured stuff to put on your gum to stop the jab nipping as much. I think you'll be amazed how much better dentists have got.