It’s notoriously difficult to teach younger kids about the importance of oral health. It’s not their fault – kids just have a hard time grasping long-term consequences at an age when 20 seems old.
So when your kids get cavities, it’s easy to wonder why you’d spend the money on getting them filled. After all, that tooth is just going to fall out anyway, right? What’s the point in filling a cavity in a tooth that’ll end up under a pillow awaiting the tooth fairy? Well, let’s take a look at that.
Potential infection risk
If you don’t fill cavities in kids’ baby teeth, there’s always the risk that the cavity will spread to the adult tooth beneath, causing infection in that tooth, your child’s gums, and potentially the jaw bone as well. When a dentist recommends a filling for a baby tooth, it’s largely for this reason.
Loss of adult teeth
On top of the infection risk, one thing that Dr. Joseph Rajabi and Dr. Reza Rajabi will point out as a risk of not filling a cavity in a baby tooth is the risk of losing the adult tooth beneath it. Cavities easily spread from tooth to tooth, and if the cavity gets bad enough it can cause one to form in the adult tooth beneath it. That means your child doesn’t lose just one tooth to a cavity, but two.
That results in higher dental costs throughout your child’s adolescence, and a painful experience for them as well. Here at New Age Dental in Riverside, California, our team has seen this situation play out far too often. We don’t want to see it happen to you and your child.
For more information, or to schedule an appointment, call us today at 951-360-0696.