Dental Advice

[pyrohornIII 4823]

My friend in ATL who is recovering from COVID long haul has a 12 yo daughter who fell about February and knocked out three of her upper front teeth.  I'd really like to help as I have to imagine how traumatic that is for a girl entering teen years to not be able to smile or laugh because of that massive hole in her mouth.  

We figure her age and anticipated continued growth will make anything now temporary.  Money is pretty tight, but not impossible.

Any advice would be appreciated.  

[Updawg 2286]

Maybe try a dental school? Don’t they do procedures cheap?

[millhouse 2617]

@victory88, you the dentist on here?

[victory88 5669]

Ooof.  That is tough man.  To lose your front teeth, especially at that age can be traumatizing for a girl.  Not to mention the bullying as well.  Right now options are going to limited due to her growing and changes in bone and teeth over the next few years.  Short term, tell them to create something temporary for her like a clear retainer (similar to the invisalign trays) but with resin teeth in there.  The other option is like a partial denture to wear but those tend to be more noticeable and she will probably hate it.  We have to basically wait till she's 16-18 years old before the final treatment.  Right now, I would see a GOOD periodontist to consult to see what they can do to preserve, graft her bone so she hopefully has enough bone to place implants when she's 16-18 years old.  Not sure a periodontist what they will say as 12 years old is pretty young for grafting procedures but I would at least have that conversation.  Long term, the best option is to place 3 implants and 3 crowns and shape the tissue around them if possible.  That will yield the best results and best long term option.  That in itself will be 12-15k for 3 teeth.  If implants are not an option, they will need to place a ceramic bridge.  For a bridge, you need to cut away adjacent teeth to connect the bridge.  It's also a good option but the downsides are you will be cutting away potentially unnecessary tooth structure on the neighboring teeth and the bridge long term will probably need to be replaced every 10-15 years.  This option will probably range 5-8k.  All of this really depends on the condition of her remaining teeth and bone.   Sometimes orthodontists can place an appliance with teeth temporarily while we wait till she's older.

This is a tough situation man.  Me and a group of doctors here in DFW did a pro bono case for a 16 year old boy that had his front teeth knocked out at age 9 from his abusive dad.  It totally ruined his confidence.  He started getting in trouble and went to juve for some pretty serious crimes.  Anyways, we restored his mouth when he was 16 and you saw an immediate change in his perspective a demeanor .  Kids get bullied a lot with this stuff.

With everything said, I would see a dentist that has experience with restoring implants in aesthetic areas like the front.  They should have working relationships with good specialists that can tag team the case.   You should see a periodontist for her implants/grafting rather than an oral surgeon as they tend to be with manipulating soft tissue in aesthetic areas where as oral surgeons generally will just hack everything with little regard to what it will look like when it's healed.

[pyrohornIII 4823]

Thanks so much for the input.  I'm learning a lot.   Bevo has been messaging me as well.  Part of the problem is because her mom hasn't worked much over the past year and a half, due to being in hospital or rehab facility due to Covid, her credit was really damaged.   She was a paramedic and caught covid on the job before there were vaccines available.  It's been a long 18 months.   So that will be the next part, finding someone willing to do the work on a payment system.  

But yeah, her daughter is really feeling it.  She started cutting her own hair off the other day because some kids at school teased her about it.  Just sickening.

[ROFL BOX 6649]

[mention=449]bevo[/mention]

2nd opinion?

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