Kids Dental Fillings

At Blouberg Dental Practice we are committed to only do tooth-coloured or white dental fillings. After an initial kid's dental exam when tooth decay is diagnosed, we gently remove this and repair the tooth with a dental filling. This will require numbing the tooth to make the procedure as comfortable as possible. Numbing the tooth or injection is where a lot of the fear in dentistry lays, and in particular for our kiddies patients.

Numbing the tooth
We take the utmost care and time in doing this as gently and painlessly as possible, but realize that not everyone has the same level of pain perception. Pain perception varies tremendously in kids and anxiety or fear can enhance this perception. This is why we go the extra length and work our magic to numb the teeth in no time. To numb the tooth we first place a special numbing gel on the area and then gently anesthetize the tooth.

	Never tell your kids of any bad dental experiences you had, or scare them with going to get an injection. Your child will remember this.

The most popular dental filling for kids is called composite or resin. Composite fillings have several advantages in children:

	They are tooth-colored. They blend in with the rest of the tooth and other teeth.
	They are bonded to the tooth. This helps to seal the filling and prevents tooth decay.
	Some resins contain fluoride that prevents tooth decay.

Short attention span
The attention span of kids are very short and often times they will only allow us 10 minutes of actual working time. We are respectful of this and do not want to unnecessarily go on too long. Confidence is king and our aim is to gain there trust and confidence. This means that appointments for kids vary between 30 - 60 minutes most of the time.

Sedative Fillings
Sedative fillings are great as it helps to reduce pain and sensitivity. The sedative fillings we use most often are called glasionomers or zinc oxide and eugenol. These filling materials work very well on children's teeth and can many times be done without drilling on the tooth. The eugenol fillings contain oil of cloves and therefore calms the tooth down easily.
A sedative filling, however, is only a stopgap measure. More permanent fillings like resins need to be placed at a later stage as sedative fillings can only last for about 3-6 months. These fillings are great to help when a child is too young and cannot sit long enough for a permanent filling.

We will let you know when a sedative filling is used so you can plan for a more permanent filling at a later stage.