We all know how annoying some orthodontists’ instructions can be. Not being able to eat so many delicious foods and beverages is frustrating, but it also is a necessary step to prevent extended treatment time, as well as uncomfortable and painful situations during your treatment process.
What Is Considered an Emergency?
An emergency is an unexpected situation that many times requires some type of medical or professional assistance. There are thousands of different types of emergencies that could affect anyone. Thus, many emergencies involve your mouth and teeth, and, in some even more unlucky situations, they involve orthodontic appliances.
Dental emergencies can be as simple as needing to get some bonding for a chipped tooth and as complicated as the situation requiring emergency surgery. Whichever the case may be, if you are going through orthodontic treatment, you should be ready to make an immediate assessment of the situation to know whether you should go to the orthodontic office or the emergency room.
Keep reading to have a better understanding of emergencies that could arise during your San Ramon braces treatment.
What Is an Orthodontic Emergency?
We can split orthodontic emergencies into two big classes depending on their level of urgency. You have a minor emergency if you suffer from a small injury like a scrape on your cheek or a detachment of appliances. You can either wait a few days for your newly scheduled orthodontist appointment or try to fix it yourself at home.
Major emergencies refer to accidents or situations where you require immediate medical attention to stop your situation from worsening. Depending on how severe your injury is, it may be best to visit an emergency room first. Once they have stabilized the situation, you can schedule an emergency appointment with your Orthodontist San Ramon.
Minor Emergencies
While minor emergencies aren’t life-threatening and won’t have long-lasting effects, they can be very uncomfortable and frustrating to deal with.
Sometimes, the metal wire that goes along your brackets will loosen because of the constant talking and chewing, eventually slipping out of place to one side of your mouth and scraping your inner cheeks and gums.
Additionally, you can suffer from a loose or broken bracket if you are not careful with your orthodontic appliance and don’t respect the diet given. Loose brackets damage the inside tissue of your mouth and stop applying the pressure necessary to move your tooth to its desired position. While it isn’t an urgent matter, not fixing it for a prolonged time could lead to undesired results at the end of your orthodontic treatment.
Similar consequences can appear if your ligatures break off and you don’t seek attention in due time. Remember that the ligatures are little rubber bands that hold each bracket to the arch wire to create pressure. Consider that, usually, when one ligature breaks off, more are to follow.
Major Emergencies
Major emergencies usually come from injuries to the face that are very commonly related to sports. If you plan on practicing any sport, regularly or not, consider using a mouthguard to avoid very painful situations.
However, orthodontic issues that require immediate attention can also arise from infections or swelling in your gums, mouth, and face. Inflamed gums could be a sign of periodontal disease, which in its worst cases, could prevent you from wearing traditional braces San Ramon completely.
If you are suffering from constant, severe pain and you can’t deal with it with over-the-counter medication, you may want to start considering it an emergency situation and visit the emergency room.
How to Solve Orthodontic Urgencies (Minor Emergencies) At Home?
Ligature Popped Off
If your ligature popped off but is still in one piece, you can try putting it back on with a pair of clean tweezers. You’ll want to try this as soon as possible, as other ligatures may start breaking or falling off because of the added pressure.
Loose or Broken Bracket
Loose or broken brackets don’t require an immediate fix to prevent more damage to the appliance. Still, you will want a temporary solution for them very quickly once they start irritating your inner lips. You can try using dental relief wax. Just take a small ball of wax and push it on top of the bracket. This will prevent the metal part from constantly touching your inner mouth.
Loose Wire
There are a couple of solutions that you could try for a loose wire. First, you can try to push it back into place with the eraser part of a pencil or a Q-tip. If you can’t push it back, try the orthodontic relief wax already mentioned, put a little bit of it at the pointy end of the wire, and make sure it doesn’t fall out.
If you don’t have dental wax, you can try using tweezers to bend it onto itself so that the pointy bit hits your teeth rather than your cheeks or gums.
Keep Your Teeth and Braces Healthy
If you suffer from any type of accident and require an emergency orthodontist San Ramon, come visit us at Bigman Orthodontics. If you wish to schedule an appointment or have some doubts regarding your treatment, you can call us here.