Unfortunately a lot of dentistry has been put off over the last year and resulted in many patients coming in as emergency cases. Nevertheless, as your dentist in Sheffield, we are here to provide the emergency treatment you need when you need it.
Triage- assessing your needs
The first stage in any emergency treatment is to perform an assessment of what is needed and to deal with the most severe or worrying symptoms first.
If you are experiencing blood loss from a damaged tooth or gum you should find clean cloth or napkins and bite down on it for 20 minutes. If you have any other dental emergencies (swelling, discomfort etc), you should call our receptionist team for more advice.
Emergency appointments what to expect
Every emergency is different and exactly what treatments are carried out will vary from case to case but there are some general things that we can talk about.
Many emergencies do not occur when you're in your local area or if you are close to your usual surgery. And therefore, it may be the first time you come to see our dentist in Sheffield when you're coming for this emergency appointment. It will be very important for us to get as much information from you as possible. We will not have access to your full dental records and if you are on any prescription medication or have any other medical conditions particularly blood clotting disorders or medication allergies, we will need to know.
During emergency dental care, particularly if our dentist in Sheffield is not your regular dental team, we will prioritize stabilising your condition and providing time-critical treatment whilst minimising tooth loss. A badly decayed tooth which is collapsing may be reinforced with dental cement and given a temporary crown but we would not carry out the full crowning procedure as it would take time to create a dental crown and some of your natural tooth would be lost.
In most dental emergencies we carry out a set of X-rays. This is part of assessing where the extent of the damage is and looking for trauma-related cracks below the gum line and decay that could descend to the root.
Affected areas will be cleaned and sterilized and depending on the amount of discomfort you're experiencing, we may use local anesthetics and can prescribe antibiotics if relevant.
Replanting knocked out teeth
A clearly knocked out tooth which is undamaged from root to tip but has been dislodged from your jaw can be re-implanted. But this is extremely time critical. The sooner the reimplanting occurs the better.
You should keep the tooth damp and safe, do not attempt to clean it as disrupting any of the tissue in or around the tooth will severely hamper it's capacity to be re-implanted. If implanted within 50 minutes, there is a very good chance that they will take and they will be as strong and healthy as they were before being dislodged. Unfortunately teeth are usually broken and damaged, making the process much harder but we will still endeavour to save teeth as part of emergency care.
If you need emergency assistance outside of our operating hours please contact NHS 111.