Dental Emergency

By Author: Adam Nicolson
Total Articles: 475
Comment this article

If you have a dental emergency, it is important to get it dealt with quickly. Aside from the fact that no one likes to be in pain, in particular toothache, which is often excruciating, failure to deal with damage to teeth promptly can result in the loss of teeth. However, it is important to recognise the difference between a dental emergency and something that can wait a day or so.

What is a Dental Emergency?

In most cases, a simple toothache is not a dental emergency. If a tooth is aching simply ringing your dentist on Monday and making an appointment is fine. However, toothache is not something you should delay dealing with making an appointment quickly is important. A tooth that is aching can lead to an infection developing in the tooth and gum, or an abscess forming. When that happens you usually have to take a course of antibiotics to clear up the infection. In the meantime, the underlying problem will remain, and so will the pain.

If an infection has already set in you do need the help of a dentist as soon as possible, so this could be considered an emergency. Likewise, if you take painkillers and ...
... are still in a lot of pain this is also an emergency. If a child is not able to sleep or eat properly because of toothache, this too should be dealt with quickly. The younger the child the more important it is to get treatment quickly.

Losing a filling or crown is not normally an emergency but should be treated as soon as possible. Again, this is to reduce the risk of infection.

Any accident that results in teeth being knocked out, broken or pushed out of position should be treated as an emergency. Getting attention quickly is important because doing so can reduce the amount of treatment needed to put the teeth back into place. Delaying treatment in these cases just means you run the risk of losing your tooth.

Getting Help with a Dental Emergency

Unfortunately, your GP or the hospital cannot help with a dental emergency. The most they can do is to give you painkillers and advice. In most cases, the best course of action is to use the emergency number your dentist provides to get help.

If you have a dental emergency, and live in or near Hull, visit the East Hull Dental Centre's website for free advice and details of how to see a dentist quickly.