Kids' Dental Emergencies: What to Do in the First Hour

Dental injuries happen on scooters, in playgrounds and on the way down the stairs, almost always at the least convenient moment. What you do in the first hour genuinely changes the outcome.

A knocked-out permanent tooth

This is the one true dental emergency, and the clock matters.

1. Find the tooth and pick it up by the crown, the white chewing part. Never touch the root.
2. If it's dirty, rinse it briefly in milk or saline. Not water, and never scrub it.
3. Try to put it back into the socket and have your child bite gently on a clean cloth to hold it there.
4. If you can't reinsert it, put it in a cup of milk. Milk keeps the root cells alive far better than water.
5. Call us immediately. Reimplantation works best within the first hour.

A knocked-out baby tooth

Do not put a baby tooth back in. Pushing it back can damage the adult tooth developing above it. Control the bleeding with clean gauze and call us so we can check the socket and the neighbouring teeth.

A chipped or broken tooth

Save any fragments in milk, rinse your child's mouth with warm water, and use a cold compress on the cheek for swelling. Small chips can often be smoothed or bonded the same day. We've had a child come in the morning after breaking a crown edge and leave in time for the water park.

Toothache

Rinse with warm salt water, floss gently either side of the tooth in case food is trapped, and give children's ibuprofen at the dose on the packet. Never put aspirin against the gum, it burns the tissue. A toothache that wakes a child at night needs an appointment, not a wait-and-see.

Swelling or fever: don't wait

Facial swelling, a bump on the gum, or a fever alongside tooth pain can mean an infection that's spreading. This is the one where you call the same day, every time.

What to keep at home

Children's ibuprofen, clean gauze, a small container with a lid, and our number saved in your phone.

We keep room in the schedule for urgent children's cases and we're open seven days a week. Call (718) 509-4888, or read more about our emergency care.