My seven year old has a front tooth that has a cavity. My dentist said it needs to be filled. I’m of the opinion that because it is a baby tooth there is no need to fill it. Dr. __________ then hinted that a good parent would fill the tooth. I find that insulting and a little dishonest. Do I really need to fill a baby tooth?!
Sylvia B. – Hattiesburg, MS
Sylvia,
I tend to agree with you. There is not really a reason to fill a front baby tooth at your child’s age. Just as you’ve reasoned, it will just fall out soon anyway. If it were a large cavity, it would make more sense to just extract the tooth, which you could probably do yourself. I think your dentist is being melodramatic to say the least. I understand your being offended at his comment about your parenting. If he is going to be that implacable, then you will be better served finding a different pediatric dentist.
There are exceptions to not filling a baby tooth. If it is a back tooth, they stay in longer. If there was a cavity in one of those, then it would definitely need to be filled. If for some reason, the tooth were so far gone that it needed to be removed, a space maintainer would need to be placed in order to hold the space for his later molars.
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