Dd needs a Root canal :-(

[GampyWabbit]

My poor dd (10) managed to break both of her front teeth in an accident last year. The teeth have broken in half horizontally. I am totally devastated by this .

We have just been seen by a child dental specialist who has found that one of the teeth has an infection and will need a root canal.

I am gutted and worried about all of this. She is extremely apprehensive about having a local anaesthetic, after the trauma of it all when she had the teeth fixed and I'm not sure how she will cope.

Any happy stories and advice would be very much appreciated.

I had this at age 11. I was and still am fine despite the fact that dentistry in the 1980s was nowhere near as good as it is today. My front teeth are now crowned...got that done in my twenties...they look great and I've only had one crown replaced since.

My DD is 9 and had to have a tooth out under local last week too...she's pvercroweded and needs a brace so she will eventually have two out either side at the back...she also had gas to help her feel a bit "out of it" while they did it and she was fine.

Don't worry...it IS upsetting but she won't be traumatized.

It is just like a big filling and shouldn't really hurt :)

My DS did exactly this at age 10. He's now 15. At the time I was very worried like you, but it was all very pain-free. Our dentist was fantastic and DS totally took the root canal work in his stride. No tears, I'm not sure he really felt anything. He now has temporary caps which look pretty good. One of the teeth is becoming discoloured, and when he's fully grown we'll look at a more permanent cosmetic solution.

But I wanted to reassure you that modern dentistry esp with children seems to deal with this kind of thing really well, and for my child at least it wasn't an awful experience at all.

Thank you so much for your replies. It's really reassuring to hear your positive stories.

Dd has developed a bit of a phobia of the needle following the repair of her teeth, which is why we were referred to the dental hospital. We saw a wonderful paediatric dentist and i know they will do their best to put dd at ease. They will offer sedation (laughing gas) during the anaesthetic and procedure. Once the anaesthetic is done, I think she will get on with it ok, so long as there's no pain!! We're looking at a 4 month wait, so I won't mention it to her again until the appointment is through

Have any of you, or your children had orthodontic treatment following anything like this? Dd needs her front teeth straightened and I know that braces will put the teeth at more risk.

Hi there. DS has just finished his ortho treatment and it was fine

He had fixed braces top and bottom. His top front teeth were particularly prominent which is probably why they took such a knock when he damaged them. We were worried about how they would cope with the strain of fixed braces, but it's worked really well, and apart from the discolouration of the damaged tooth, they look lovely now.

I would recommend getting her an electric tooth brush so she gets used to the vibration & noise in her mouth.

It was really reassuring to see this post, as my son who's only 7 and had only had a few new teeth badly chipped his front adult tooth in December and although at first it seemed that the tooth had survived the knock today we discovered that it probably hasn't and may lead to root canal work. I'm totally devastated but it's reassuring to see that there are solutions and that they've worked out well. My son currently seems fine with it all so I'm trying really hard not to pass on my concerns to him, but it's difficult when asking the dentists questions in front of him. How did your daughter cope with the treatment or are you still on the waiting list?