DIY Dental Care: Tips For Coping With Dental Emergencies at Home

Serious dental symptoms like severe tooth pain, knocked-out teeth, and dental abscesses can be potentially serious and should be addressed urgently. Ignoring a dental problem like teeth damage or knock-outs can lead to permanent tooth loss, causing the need for expensive and invasive treatments in the future.

Knowing how to handle different dental emergencies until professional help is available is crucial for faster relief and fewer complications. This article provides practical tips for managing common dental emergencies at home.

Dental Emergencies and Their Remedies

Below are common oral emergencies and how to handle them:

• Severe tooth pain

Severe, throbbing tooth pain is among the most common dental emergencies. The pain is often caused by severe tooth decay, dental trauma, and gum disease. Common remedies for tooth pain include:

• Take painkillers like ibuprofen or acetaminophen
• Apply ice packs against the painful area
• Rinse with salt water
• Floss to remove something stuck between your teeth. Avoid using sharp tools as they can cause more injuries.

If the pain doesn’t settle, contact an emergency dentist near me immediately. A severe toothache can sometimes accompany symptoms like difficulty breathing, fever, and swelling.

• Dental injuries

Your tooth can break, chip, or crack when chewing hard items or during a car or sports accident. If this happens:

• Rinse and preserve any pieces of the tooth
• Rinse your mouth with warm water
• If there’s bleeding, apply a gauze pad to the area
• Take pain medications like ibuprofen to minimize any pain or discomfort
• Apply cold therapy to the cheek to reduce pain and swelling
• Visit your dentist as soon as possible
• Knocked out tooth

If your tooth has completely fallen off, you must act quickly to save your tooth. See a dentist soon, preferably within one hour, to increase your odds of saving the tooth. In the meantime:

• Hold the tooth by the crown
• Rinse it gently and re-insert it into the socket
• If that’s not possible, preserve the tooth in a small container with saliva or milk
• Take pain medications like ibuprofen for pain
• Apply ice packs to ease the pain
• Broken or detached braces

If your braces are detached or broken, see your dentist or orthodontist urgently to reduce the risk of more injuries to your mouth’s soft tissues. Do not adjust or repair the braces, which can cause more damage and injuries. Use dental wax to shield the sharp edges of the braces to protect your mouth from injuries.

• Damaged or dislodged restorations

If a filling or crown gets damaged or falls off, see a dentist as soon as possible for repair and replacement. Meanwhile, try the following remedies:

• Place a dental cement or adhesive to reattach the restoration temporarily
• Place a sugar-free gum to replace a lost filling
• Take pain medications like ibuprofen for comfort
• Preserve the damaged or fallen restoration in a container and take it to the dentist
• Dental abscess

Abscesses are infections that collect as a pus-filed pimple at a tooth root or between gums and teeth. Abscess are severe infections and should be treated urgently to prevent them from spreading. Below are possible remedies:

• Seek immediate dental care near you
• Rinse regularly with a saltwater solution
• Take over-the-counter medications to alleviate any pain and swelling
• Soft tissues injuries

Dental trauma can cause severe injuries to the cheeks, gums, lips, tongue, palate, and other soft tissues of the mouth. To manage your symptoms:

• See a dentist immediately
• Rinse with a mild saltwater solution
• Hold a gauze pad over the injury to control bleeding
• Apply a cold compress to reduce bleeding, pain, and swelling
• Take pain medications like ibuprofen to reduce pain
• Jaw pain or injuries

See a dental professional immediately if your jaw is locked, swollen, broken, or painful. In the meantime, try the following remedies:

• Apply cold therapy to minimize swelling and pain
• Take over-the-counter non-steroidal medications to manage pain and swelling
• Avoid trigger activities like yawning, chewing, or opening the mouth widely

Do you have a dental emergency in Merrimack, NH?

Do you have serious dental symptoms like severe tooth pain or injuries? Or do you need more home remedies for dental emergencies? Contact Yelena Popkova, DDS – Merrimack, to book your consultation.