Smile Builders Pediatric Dentistry

A pediatric dentist is a dentist that has received additional specialized training necessary to provide the best care to your children. When you’re looking for a qualified pediatric dentist for your child, you want to be confident you’ve selected an individual who has the right skills and knowledge to take care of your child’s oral health competently and compassionately. A shortcut to ensuring your chosen dentist has the training to provide high-quality juvenile dental care is to ask if they are a certified pediatric dentist.

Your child’s oral health is essential to their overall well-being. Unfortunately, almost 28% of children under five have cavities or some level of tooth decay. Cavities in the primary teeth can be painful and even affect your child’s adult teeth before they erupt. Untreated tooth decay and cavities can lead to an infection in the teeth, gums, or even the jaw. Practicing good oral hygiene, including annual dental checkups, can keep teeth and the surrounding tissue healthy.

As children enter their teen years, maintaining good oral hygiene is important. Braces, fluctuating hormones, nutrition, and mouth jewelry can contribute to dental issues ranging from tooth decay to tongue and gum infections. Understanding teen dentistry needs and learning about the different services pediatric dentists can offer them helps ensure that your child receives the appropriate treatments and procedures when necessary.

Preventative dental care positively impacts a child’s development. Studies by the CDC show that maintaining healthy teeth and gums in childhood leads to better overall health and wellness in adulthood. While office visits play a critical role in dental prevention, good long-term dental habits usually are developed at home. By understanding more about preventative care, you can become proactive about your child’s oral health.

Tooth extraction is the surgical removal of your child’s permanent (adult) or primary (baby) teeth. While the idea of “surgical removal” sounds scary, the process is very simple, straightforward, and safe. If your child feels frightened about their upcoming tooth removal, help them understand what will happen. It’s normal to feel frightened of something new, but if you stay calm, your child will feel more reassured.

Approximately 36% of Americans avoid dental visits because they’re afraid or anxious. In extreme circumstances, you may end up losing teeth, developing an infection, or developing oral cancer by refusing dental care. Fortunately, the dental team at Iredell Pediatric Dentistry in Statesville utilizes dental IV sedation techniques to help their patients get the necessary dental care without experiencing pain or anxiety.

A frenectomy is an in-office treatment in which an isolate of connective tissue under the tongue (lingual frenum) or the tissue connecting the upper lip to the gums (labial frenum) is removed to relieve tongue-tie, lip-tie, and related problems. Any procedure involving the removal or modification of binding tissue on the body can be called a frenectomy or frenotomy. During the infant stage of development, frenectomy surgeries are quite common. Pediatricians and dentists often check for lip or tongue-tie conditions during routine checkups. However, it is common for these issues to go undiscovered well into adolescence.

Experts recommend that a child’s dental cleanings begin within six to 12 months of the eruption of the first tooth. It’s important to establish an early baseline exam of the teeth, oral tissues, jaws, gums, and bite to compare against future development and growth.

Dental emergencies can happen at any time, anywhere. Children and teenagers can require emergency dental care for numerous reasons. Stay calm, regardless of the reason you need emergency care. Not only will this help you best assess the severity of the dental emergency, but it’ll also help your child stay calm. Apply at-home first aid as necessary, then follow up with a trip to the dentist or emergency room (ER), as detailed below. Don’t hesitate to call 911 if you believe the injury requires immediate professional medical attention.

The use of dental crowns in children’s dentistry is more common than you think. According to recent statistics, nearly 60% of children in the US had at least one cavity by five years of age. Cavities are the holes in your teeth caused by tooth decay. Extensive cavities may cause discomfort while eating as the food particles can get stuck inside these holes easily.