Dentist in Greensboro, NC explains how a stainless-steel crown may save your baby’s tooth

Baby teeth may be temporary, but they play a huge role and are essential to the eventual emergence of your child’s permanent teeth. Your baby’s teeth, also called primary dentition, also are critical to your child’s speech development and ability to chew foods properly. These are just a couple reasons why, when your baby develops decay in a primary tooth, that the best solution may be a stainless-steel crown. Dr. Sona Isharani and her team at Triad pediatric dentistry have been applying stainless steel crowns to baby teeth in the Greensboro, NC area with great success and are trusted by the families who come in for dental assistance.

Protecting your child’s baby teeth

Most parents are not fully aware just how long baby teeth remain in their child’s mouth. The truth of the matter is that these little teeth need to remain healthy and functional for several years. The first baby tooth will typically surface when your baby is around six months, with all of them having surfaced by the age of two to three. Although many children will begin to lose a few of these baby teeth around the age of 6, the primary molars will remain until they are much older, around 12 or 13 years old. Keeping these teeth healthy and strong until they fall out naturally. They assist the permanent teeth to grow into the proper position and reduce the chance of extensive (and expensive!) orthodontic work later.

Stainless Steel

If a baby tooth has become seriously decayed to the point a simple filling is not going to help, the tooth may need to be restored with a stainless-steel crown. This is especially true if the tooth has undergone pulpal therapy such as a root canal. Once your dentist has removed decay from the tooth, a prefabricated stainless-steel crown will be fit and cemented over the tooth. There are several advantages to a stainless-steel crown, including:

• Inexpensive and durable
• Complete protection of the tooth
• Minimal sensitivity
• Need for retreatment is minimal
• Higher rate of success than metal fillings in children under 4

Parents can be at ease as stainless-steel crowns are quite common for children with baby teeth.

Prevention

While we all know that tooth decay is preventable, it’s still reported that anywhere from 60 to 90 percent of young children suffer from cavities requiring some form of treatment. If you would like your child to avoid the need for a stainless-steel crown, there is a lot you can do for them. The first of these is immediate prevention, including cleaning your newborn baby’s gums from day 1 with wet gauze or a washcloth. Once teeth begin to appear, you can still clean as you have been before graduating to a toothbrush You can educate your children in healthy brushing habits until they are ready to take over for themselves. Hopefully through early education, they will never need to worry about tooth decay.

If you child does face a situation in which tooth decay has advanced to the point a stainless-steel crown is needed, please give Dr. Sona Isharani a call today at (336) 804-8668. She will treat your child like her own and provide gentle and deliberate care.