Trip to the Dentist

We all went to the dentist yesterday and asked Mr Bayes about Jamie's grey tooth. We were worried that it was because he / we had not been brushing properly. However, he assured us that it was due to him banging his tooth at some point. I suspect this happened the night we ended up at A&E (see: http://grumpymumtobe.blogspot.com/2011/08/first-trip-to.html. I looked it up on the Internet and found:

If a child bumps his primary baby tooth, it may turn dark. Usually this happens two to three weeks after an accident. It's usually a gray or purple like color. Whether it turns dark or not doesn't always depend on the severity of the injury. I will say, however, that if the tooth is displaced or knocked very loose at the time of the injury, there seems to be a greater chance of it turning dark. Sometimes it can turn a pink color which can be another thing called internal resorption where the tooth resorbs from the inside out.

Will the tooth ever lighten back up? It can lighten back. In fact most do, but it takes a while. There is just not a good blood supply there. In addition, there may have been such displacement of the tooth that the blood supply is damaged. Those teeth may not recover or lighten at all. Having said all that, most dark baby teeth do lighten back. If it is a permanent tooth, then it's a whole other ball game. A traumatized permanent tooth that turns dark usually means the tooth is dead and will need a root canal to save it.

How long will it take? Well, baby teeth seem to take several months to lighten, usually I will say around six months or so. I often explain that it is kind of like a bruise inside the tooth. Unlike a bruise on the skin where there is a good blood supply, the tooth takes a longer amount of time to recover. Sometimes it will lighten to sort of a slight opaque look, which is barely noticeable. This is due to the canal inside the tooth closing up. It's kind of like a scar inside the tooth. If this happens then the tooth looks pretty good and is not likely to have any further problems.

Sometimes the tooth never lightens. It stays dark. There often is no need for treatment. In a few cases the tooth can abscess due to the death of the pulp inside the tooth. The body can't get in there to heal. So it is important to watch for that. If the tooth is dark and you just don't like looking at it, then we can do a filling on the front or a white crown if indicated.

In summary, it is a very common thing to see that dark baby tooth because kids are bumping their teeth all the time. It will likely lighten back up. If it doesn't, there still may be no treatment needed other than observation. Rarely, it will abscess and need removal or a baby tooth root canal. Of course, see your dentist for the appropriate treatment.

http://cyberdentist.blogspot.com/2006/03/my-childs-tooth-is-turning-dark.html