3 teeth out under GA in a 5 year old - anyone else been there?

[pacinofan]

DD1 whisked into A&E on Thursday after her face swelled up rather quickly. Her dentist had seen her on Monday as she was complaining of a pain in her cheek. She did, what she called, a very small 'filling' - more like a little 'covering' with some white paste. By Thursday, dd was quite poorly with a swollen cheek and temperature. We visited the dentist again who I could see was quite scared - she said she wouldn't treat it and advised us to go a&e. We were advised to have the tooth removed under general anaesthetic without delay, along with 2 others which were presenting problems and the dentist hadn't spotted.

Result was dd1 was admitted and had 3 teeth removed under a general. She is fine, at home now, but we are feeling absolutely raw. To see your little one go under an anaesthetic takes courage - it left us both sobbing, me clutching my prayer card that I carry with me at all times, even though I'm not that religious, but has helped me through challenging times.

And please, before anybody asks 'so you give your child coke/sweets everyday' the answer is no, we don't. We are actually quite puzzled as to how this situtation happened since we think our childrens' diets are pretty good. Anyone else out there facing similar?

Thanks,

What an ordeal - sounds awful. Poor wee thing. I have no experience as a mother but I did have a few GA's as a child and looking back I think my mum suffered more than me.

We had something similar with DS2, at around the same age. He had a small filling at the dentist which upset him so much that she referred him to our local Dental Hospital for the remaining work (one other small filling or so we believed) They discovered that the decay was far more advanced than our dentist thought (although a 6 month delay in getting an appointment with them probably didn't help!) so poor old DS2 had to have a tooth removed and two large fillings done under GA two days before his 6th birthday.

Like you I was accused of feeding him a diet consisting of sugar and fizzy drinks, which is rubbish (DS2 hates fizzy drinks, they get sweets once a week if that at my MILs) I gave up arguing in the end, but I used to get very very angry with certain people at the hospital. In the end an incredibly nice woman pointed out that DS2 had very deep natural crevasses in his baby teeth that were very difficult to clean (she had the same problem) We found that using a children's mouthwash has really helped to stop a repeat of DS2s problems. Unfortunately we're still working through some of the issues caused by the intial treatment itself (lovely dental phobia, which we're slowly resolving )

I'm sorry about your experience, I hope you all feel steadier soon. It's horrible when things happen to your children that are out of your control.

We are having a similar situation with DD. We have opted to go to a private clinic who do the extraction under gas and air instead of going to the hospital for a GA. I have posted on this topic before, as I was worried about how this could have happened, ie no fizzy drinks ever and limited sweets. Serenity, what mouthwash do you use please?

Psychoboy1 had to have a whole load of his teeth out (again, diet not the issue), poor little man was left with just a few teeth left.

I feel for you, and for your poor little one.

Sweets are the cause of some dental problems, but of course not ALL! Lots of people just have weak teeth/deep places to clean.

We use Reach Junior Yum , it's the only one I can find and even then it's hard to find a store that actually stocks it. I tend to have to go to big Superdrugs or Boots. Most average size supermarkets don't seem to do it anymore. It actually says on there it's not for under 6's but we used it earlier under advisement from the dentist (just have to be really strict they don't swallow it)

Oh and we were also told to use a high fluoride toothpaste - most children's toothpastes are around 500ppm, but a few (ASDA and Superdrug own brand are all I can remember at the moment) are 1000ppm. Most branded ones are very low. It would help if DS2 could tolerate adult toothpaste, but the strong flavour makes him heave.

been there, got the toothbrush!

dd was 5 when she had 6 teeth out under GA and 3 fillings too, was devastated as she didnt have a bad diet but from then on have stopped all but one glass of squash a day so i was the nasty one for ages in our house.
i was 8months pregnant when she had this done so you can imagine the hormones when she went in i dissolved in to heaps of tears.
now im the tooth brushing police and i nag nag nag until the cow's come home

Poor you - hope your dd is recovering. No experience but was "chatting" to my dentist rather nervously on Friday ( whilst having filling relaced). He advises to give all fruit juice ( even diluted ) and nonmilk/water through a straw ( to miss teeth). I live in an area which has fluoride in the water and apparently this makes major difference - he said he just doesn't see kids here with lots of caries. Do you know if your water has fluoride in it?

Natural for us all to feel that we are to blame as mothers when things go wrong. Sometimes things are just bad luck...