Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Dental Dilemma

A couple years ago, Brigham had a molar pulled, see here.  It is second to the back on the bottom right side.  The hope at the time was that we could use orthodontics to pull the back molar into the empty spot and then have a wisdom tooth, in turn, take the back molar's place.  Our first orthodontic consult was today and we were given three options.

1. do nothing - yea right
2. braces on the bottom set of teeth, plus a spacer and retainer for about a year to move the back molar into the empty spot. 
3. a spacer to hold the empty spot and straighten the back molar. Implant when he is done growing, somewhere between 18-24.

I'm not sure which I prefer.  Two will be done sooner, but has less chance of success.  His back molar is already tilting forward and with nothing to brace it from behind it will be hard to get it onto the same plane as the other teeth. On the other hand, I'm not sure about implants. There is a part of me that really rebels against the idea of a foreign body inserted into his bones.   The downside of the implant is that it is also more expensive and the wait to get it done is fairly lengthy. He is not excited about the second option because that could mean 2-3 years total of braces and he loves playing his trumpet. Brigham will need a full set of braces after treatment, no matter which option we end up with. 

What do you all think?  I didn't have to wear braces (my teeth are pretty amazing) so I'm not really in tune with all the pain and travail that brings.

1 comment:

Maren Hansen said...

I told you about Adia's pre-molars right? Same problem--only babies, no permanent teeth. The babies have to be yanked because they are too small and messing up her bite. We also asked about the option for the wisdom teeth to take the space up later. He had a lot of good reasons not to do it: wisdom teeth might be impacted, or never actually come down, or they might be the wrong size. It's a big gamble. So Adia has braces for 18 months so we can get those babies out and make space for implants. Then she will wear a retainer till 18 when she gets the implants. You should look up stuff about the implants. They are freakishly expensive, but I think they are a good choice in the long run. Or he could get a retainer with those fake teeth in them... One of my boyfriends had them. ;)