After Dental Trauma Care: Splints, Follow-Up Visits and How the Tooth Is Monitored

The splint went on at 9:40 on a Saturday night, in a dental emergency room that smelled of latex and cold coffee. A thin wire and a few dabs of composite now hold a fourteen-year-old’s front tooth in the socket it left forty minutes earlier on a basketball court. Her father has one question, and he asks it three times on the drive home: is it going to stay?

Nobody can answer that yet, and an honest dentist will say so. What can be explained, in detail, is what the next weeks and months will look like. Dental trauma recovery is less a single repair than a long observation period, with a predictable rhythm of splint checks, gentle tapping, cold tests and x-rays. The tooth itself will announce, slowly, whether its nerve and root are healing.

This article walks through that rhythm: why splints are used, how long they typically stay on, what each visit is looking for, and which changes should bring you back early.

What qualifies as dental trauma?

Dental trauma is any injury caused by force to the teeth, the bone that holds them or the gums and lips around them. A chipped corner from a bottle cap counts. So does a tooth pushed sideways in a bicycle fall, or one knocked out entirely by an elbow. The word covers a wide range, which is why treatment and follow-up vary so much from one person to the next.

Dentists sort these injuries into a few families, and the names matter because each one carries its own splinting time and monitoring plan. The International Association of Dental Traumatology (IADT), whose guidelines most dental teams follow, groups them as follows:

• Fractures: a crack or break in the crown, the root, or both. Some expose only enamel; others open the pulp, the soft tissue of nerves and blood vessels inside the tooth.
• Concussion and subluxation: the tooth is bruised in its socket. In concussion it is tender but not loose; in subluxation it is loose but has not moved.
• Luxations: the tooth has been displaced. It may be partly pulled out (extrusion), pushed sideways (lateral luxation) or driven up into the bone (intrusion).
• Avulsion: the tooth is completely out of the socket.
• Alveolar fracture: the bone segment holding several teeth has broken.

Front teeth take most of the impact simply because they lead. Falls in toddlers, playground and sports collisions in older children, and road accidents and assaults in adults account for the bulk of injuries. Whatever the cause, the dentist’s first job is not to fix the tooth but to identify exactly which injury pattern, or combination of patterns, is present, because a tooth can be fractured and luxated at the same time.

What happens at the first dental trauma recovery visit?

The first appointment sets the baseline that every later visit will be measured against. Expect it to be thorough even if the tooth looks fine, because the injuries that cause the most long-term trouble are often invisible on the day.

The dentist will start with the story: what hit the tooth, how hard, and when. Time matters most for a knocked-out tooth, where minutes out of the mouth change the outlook, but it also helps predict which bruised teeth are likely to lose their nerve supply. If you lost consciousness, vomited or have a headache, expect to be redirected to medical care first; a head injury outranks a tooth.

Next comes a careful look at the lips and gums for cuts and embedded fragments, then each tooth in the injured area is tested. The dentist will tap gently to check for tenderness and listen to the sound, press to feel for looseness, and often apply a cold stimulus to see whether the nerve responds. That cold test is frequently negative right after an injury even when the pulp is healthy, which is why a single reading is never treated as a verdict.

X-rays follow, usually more than one angle of the same tooth, because root fractures hide easily. If a tooth is displaced, it is repositioned under local anesthetic, checked again on an x-ray, and stabilized with a splint. If a tooth is out and can be replanted, that happens first and everything else waits.

Before you leave, you should have three things: a written record of which injuries were found, a splint-removal date if one was placed, and a follow-up schedule. Those notes become the map for the months ahead.

How does a dental splint work?

A dental splint is a temporary brace that ties an injured tooth to its healthy neighbors so the ligament and bone around it can knit back together. The ligament in question is the periodontal ligament, a thin band of fibers that suspends each tooth in its socket and acts as a shock absorber. Trauma tears those fibers; the splint gives them stillness to reattach.

The modern version looks modest. A short length of thin, flexible wire, sometimes a strip of nylon fishing line or a fine mesh, is bonded to the front surface of the injured tooth and one or two teeth on either side with small dots of tooth-colored composite. It takes ten or fifteen minutes to place and does not usually require any drilling.

The word to notice is flexible. Older splints were rigid, and the thinking was that total immobility helped. Research reviewed in the IADT guidelines pointed the other way: a tooth that can move a tiny amount under chewing pressure appears to heal with a healthier ligament and less risk of fusing to the bone. The current recommendation is a passive, flexible splint that holds the tooth in position without pulling it and without locking it solid.

Passive also means the splint is not meant to move teeth. If a tooth has been repositioned and sits slightly off from its neighbors, the splint holds that position; it does not correct it. Later orthodontic movement, if needed, is a separate decision made after healing.

While the splint is on, it will collect plaque along the wire. Brushing around it with a soft brush and using any rinse your dentist suggests matters more than usual, because inflamed gums slow the very healing the splint is there to protect.

Tooth splint how long: typical splinting times by injury

People are often surprised by how short splint times are. The instinct is that a tooth that was knocked loose should be braced for months; the evidence says a couple of weeks is usually enough for the ligament to regain its grip, and longer splinting brings its own risks.

The durations below are the typical ranges in the IADT guidelines for permanent teeth. Your dentist may extend or shorten them based on how firm the tooth feels at the removal visit.

Injury	Splint usually needed?	Typical duration
Concussion (tender, not loose)	No	None
Subluxation (loose, not moved)	Only if very mobile	Up to 2 weeks
Extrusion (partly out)	Yes	About 2 weeks
Avulsion (knocked out and replanted)	Yes	About 2 weeks
Lateral luxation (pushed sideways)	Yes	About 4 weeks
Intrusion (pushed into bone), after repositioning	Yes	About 4 weeks
Root fracture, middle or tip of root	Yes	About 4 weeks
Root fracture near the gum line	Yes	Up to 4 months
Alveolar (bone) fracture	Yes	About 4 weeks

Two patterns explain the table. Injuries that mainly damage the ligament heal fastest, so two weeks covers them. Injuries that also break bone or root need the longer window, since bone repairs on a slower clock than ligament. The one outlier, a root fracture close to the crown, is splinted longest because that fragment has very little bone around it and is under the most leverage every time you bite.

Removing a splint takes only minutes: the composite dots are polished away and the tooth is tested for firmness. If it still feels loose, the splint may simply go back on for another check.

Who usually gets a splint, and who is asked to wait?

Not every injured tooth is splinted, and not every tooth that is loose needs one. The decision turns on two questions: has the tooth moved, and is it mobile enough that normal chewing would keep disturbing the healing ligament?

A tooth that has been displaced and repositioned almost always gets a splint, because without it the tooth tends to drift back toward where the injury left it. A tooth that is loose but still in its original position is a judgment call; many are left alone with a soft diet and rechecked in a week or two, and only the very mobile ones are braced. A tooth that is merely tender is watched, not splinted.

Children with baby teeth sit in a different category. Primary teeth are rarely splinted, and a knocked-out baby tooth is not replanted at all, because forcing it back risks damaging the adult tooth developing just above it in the bone. A displaced baby tooth is often left to settle on its own or, if it is interfering with the bite or pushed toward the developing adult tooth, removed. This can feel like undertreatment to a worried parent. It is deliberate: the aim is to protect the permanent tooth, and the baby tooth is expendable.

Young permanent teeth, meaning those whose roots are still forming, are handled more conservatively than mature ones. An intruded tooth in a child with an open root tip is often left to re-erupt on its own over weeks, while the same injury in an adult is usually repositioned and splinted promptly.

People are also asked to wait when there is a competing priority. A suspected concussion, a jaw fracture or a deep facial laceration takes precedence, and the tooth is stabilized once those are addressed. Waiting a few hours for a splint on a subluxated tooth changes little; waiting for medical assessment of a head injury can change a great deal.

What do the first two weeks of dental trauma recovery look like?

The early phase is unglamorous and mostly about leaving the tooth alone. Soreness peaks in the first two or three days, especially in the gum and lip if they were cut, then settles. A displaced tooth that was repositioned often aches when tapped for a week or more, which is normal ligament healing rather than a sign of trouble.

Eating shifts to soft food, and the guidelines suggest keeping it that way for roughly two weeks after a luxation or replantation. Soft does not mean liquid: pasta, eggs, fish, yogurt and well-cooked vegetables all work. Biting into anything with the front teeth, from apples to sandwiches, is the habit to break, and cutting food small and chewing at the back becomes the routine.

Hygiene is the part people underestimate. The injured area should be brushed after every meal with a soft brush, gently but not skipped, and an antiseptic mouth rinse is commonly advised for the first week or two to keep bacteria down around the splint and any gum wounds. Smoking slows healing and is worth pausing entirely during this window.

Contact sports and anything with a risk of a second blow are usually off for the splinting period and often a little longer. A custom mouthguard is worth discussing before returning, particularly for a child who plays a stick or ball sport.

The first follow-up visit typically falls at around two weeks, when a short-term splint is removed and the tooth is retested. If a root canal is planned, it is often started at this visit too, because the guidelines advise beginning it within about two weeks for a replanted or intruded tooth with a fully formed root.

Why are there so many follow-up visits?

A typical schedule after a moderate or severe injury runs like this: two weeks, four weeks, three months, six months, one year, then yearly for several more years. For a replanted tooth the IADT guidelines advise that yearly checks continue for at least five years. People who came in for a fifteen-minute splint sometimes find that number hard to justify. The reason is that the two most damaging complications after trauma develop silently and on very different timelines.

The first is pulp necrosis, meaning the nerve and blood supply inside the tooth die. It can follow a displacement within weeks, but it can also appear a year or more later in a tooth that seemed to be recovering. It rarely hurts at first. Left undetected, the dead tissue becomes infected and the infection leaks out through the root tip, where it can begin dissolving the root from the outside.

The second is root resorption, the process in which the body’s own cells break down root structure. One form is driven by that infection and can destroy a root in months in a young patient. Another form, replacement resorption, happens when bone fuses directly to the root and slowly replaces it over years. Both are far easier to manage when caught early on an x-ray than once they are visible or painful.

Each visit, then, is a checkpoint against a known risk. The early ones catch necrosis and infection-related resorption while treatment can still stop them. The later ones watch for the slow fusion of tooth to bone, which matters most in a growing child because a fused tooth stops moving with the jaw and gradually sinks below its neighbors.

Skipping the later visits because the tooth feels fine is the most common way a treatable problem becomes an untreatable one.

How is the tooth monitored at each check?

Monitoring uses the same small set of tests every time, which is the point: the dentist is looking for change against the baseline recorded on day one.

The visit usually opens with questions about pain, looseness, sensitivity to temperature and whether the tooth has changed color. Then comes the clinical exam. Gentle tapping checks for tenderness and, just as importantly, sound. A healthy tooth gives a dull note; a tooth that has begun to fuse to bone produces a higher, metallic ring that an experienced ear picks up early. Pressing on the tooth assesses mobility, which should decrease over the first weeks and then stay stable. The gum is checked for swelling, a small pimple-like drainage point or a pocket forming alongside the root.

Pulp sensibility testing follows. A cold stimulus, sometimes an electric pulp tester, is applied and the response compared with an uninjured tooth. Here the guidelines are candid: injured teeth often fail to respond for weeks or months and then recover, so a negative test on its own does not mean the nerve has died. What matters is the pattern over several visits, combined with other findings. A tooth that regains response is reassuring; a tooth that stays unresponsive and also darkens or becomes tender is a different picture.

X-rays complete the check at most visits. The dentist compares them against earlier films for a dark area at the root tip, thinning or notching of the root surface, loss of the fine ligament space around the root, or narrowing of the pulp canal as it fills with hard tissue.

Color is the sign families notice first. A grey or dark tooth can indicate a dying pulp, while a yellowish tint often signals the opposite, a pulp that survived and is laying down extra dentin. Neither is diagnosed by color alone.

When is root canal treatment needed after trauma?

Root canal treatment removes the pulp from inside a tooth, disinfects the space and seals it. After trauma it is not automatic; whether and when it is done depends mostly on the injury type and on whether the root has finished forming.

For a mature tooth, one with a closed root tip, the blood vessels entering through that narrow opening are easily severed by displacement. The guidelines therefore anticipate that a replanted tooth or a significantly intruded tooth with a closed apex will almost always lose its pulp, and advise starting root canal treatment within about two weeks rather than waiting for signs of trouble. Acting early removes the tissue before it can become infected and trigger the fast form of root resorption.

For a young tooth with an open root tip, the opposite logic applies. The wide opening gives the pulp a real chance of regaining a blood supply, and the guidelines favor watching closely rather than intervening, because a root canal on an immature tooth halts root growth and leaves thin, fragile walls. The team will test frequently and act only if necrosis becomes evident.

For teeth that were bruised or loosened without displacement, root canal treatment is done only if monitoring shows the pulp has died. Many of these teeth recover fully.

The procedure itself is usually spread across visits. A medicated dressing is often placed inside the root for a period before the final filling, giving time for any early root surface inflammation to settle. If the tooth is discolored, internal bleaching can be discussed once the root is sealed.

Whether to proceed, and when, is a decision for the treating dentist or endodontist based on your specific x-rays and tests. The timelines above are guideline ranges, not rules that apply identically to every tooth.

Knocked out tooth recovery: what replantation really means

A knocked-out permanent tooth put back within minutes has a reasonable chance of settling in; one that spent an hour drying on a sidewalk faces a harder road. The difference lies in the ligament cells clinging to the root surface, which begin dying as soon as they dry. The IADT guidelines treat about sixty minutes of dry time as the threshold beyond which most of those cells are lost, and storage in milk or saliva buys additional time compared with a dry tissue or pocket.

Understanding this explains the shape of knocked out tooth recovery. In the best case, with a short dry time, the ligament reattaches and the tooth behaves almost normally for years. With a long dry time, the ligament cannot regenerate, and the body instead fuses bone directly to the root. The tooth is firm, functional and usually painless, but it has become, in effect, a well-tolerated foreign object that the body will slowly replace with bone over years.

Both outcomes are considered successes at the time of replantation. The realistic goal, especially in a child, is often to keep the natural tooth in place long enough for the jaw to finish growing, so that a permanent replacement, if one is eventually needed, can be planned in an adult-sized mouth.

The early weeks follow the standard pattern: a flexible splint for about two weeks, a soft diet, meticulous hygiene, and root canal treatment started within roughly two weeks for a mature tooth. The guidelines also advise checking tetanus status and commonly recommend a course of antibiotics after replantation; the choice of antibiotic and whether it is appropriate for a particular patient is a decision for the prescribing clinician.

Follow-up is the longest of any injury: two weeks, four weeks, three months, six months, one year and then yearly for at least five years, watching primarily for resorption and, in children, for the tooth beginning to sit lower than its neighbors.

Root resorption after trauma and the other complications your team watches for

Most people leave a trauma appointment worried about the tooth falling out. The complications that actually end teeth are quieter, and they are the reason the follow-up schedule exists.

Pulp necrosis and infection. The pulp dies, bacteria colonize the space and the infection escapes through the root tip. Signs include darkening, tenderness to tapping, gum swelling, a small drainage bump on the gum and a dark halo at the root tip on x-ray. Root canal treatment addresses it.

Infection-related root resorption. When an infected pulp sits next to a root surface already damaged by the injury, the body’s clean-up cells attack the root itself. On x-ray the root looks moth-eaten. It can progress quickly in young patients but typically stops once the pulp space is cleaned and medicated, which is why early root canal treatment is emphasized for high-risk injuries.

Replacement resorption, or ankylosis. Bone fuses to the root and gradually replaces it. The tooth loses its mobility entirely, gives a metallic note when tapped and, in a growing child, appears to sink as the surrounding bone keeps developing. It cannot be reversed, but the rate is slow and the tooth often remains for years. Planning around it, sometimes by removing the crown and leaving the root to preserve bone, is a specialist discussion.

Pulp canal obliteration. A surviving pulp responds to injury by filling its own canal with hard tissue. The tooth may turn slightly yellow and stop responding to cold. It is usually left alone, and most such teeth stay healthy, though the narrowed canal makes any later root canal treatment technically harder.

Damage to the developing adult tooth. After injury to a baby tooth, the permanent successor can erupt with a white or brown patch, a bent crown or, rarely, not at all. This is monitored with x-rays until the adult tooth appears.

How long does a traumatized tooth take to heal?

The honest answer has two parts, because a traumatized tooth heals in layers and each layer has its own timeline.

The ligament and gum heal first. Tenderness fades over one to two weeks, and mobility usually returns to normal within the splinting period, roughly two to four weeks depending on the injury, as the guidelines’ splint durations reflect. Cuts to the lip and gum close within about a week. By the four-week visit most people have forgotten to favor the tooth when they eat.

Bone heals next. A fractured socket or a root fracture remodels over several months, and a dentist will not usually call a root fracture healed until x-rays taken at the three- and six-month visits show a bridge of hard tissue or a stable, uninfected gap between the fragments.

The pulp is the slowest and least predictable. A bruised nerve may take weeks to months to respond normally to testing again, and in a young tooth, revascularization after displacement is judged over the first year. Conversely, a pulp that is going to fail may not show it for a year or longer. This is why the traumatized tooth healing time quoted by most guidelines is not a single number but a monitoring window of at least twelve months, extending to five years for replanted teeth.

There is a useful way to hold these timelines in mind. Firmness and comfort come back in weeks; bone confirms itself in months; the nerve’s verdict takes a year. A tooth that feels normal at a month is genuinely encouraging, but it has passed only the first of three tests.

Individual factors shift these ranges: age, whether the root was fully formed, how long a tooth was out of the mouth, how well hygiene was kept up and whether there were additional injuries to the same tooth. Your dentist’s estimate for your tooth will be more accurate than any general range.

What people often get wrong about dental trauma recovery

“If it doesn’t hurt, it’s fine.” Pulp death after trauma is frequently painless for months. Comfort tells you the ligament has settled; it says nothing reliable about the nerve. The follow-up x-rays are doing a job that sensation cannot.

“A knocked-out baby tooth should go back in.” It should not. Replanting a primary tooth risks damaging the adult tooth forming above it, and the guidelines are clear that primary teeth are not replanted. Rinse the child’s mouth, control bleeding with gentle pressure, and have the area checked.

“Scrub the knocked-out tooth clean before putting it back.” Scrubbing strips the ligament cells the tooth needs to reattach. Hold it by the crown, rinse it briefly if it is dirty, and replant or store it in milk. Never wrap it in a dry tissue.

“A tighter, longer splint heals better.” The evidence supports short, flexible splinting. Rigid or prolonged splinting is associated with more ankylosis, not less.

“The tooth is dark, so it’s dead.” Color change is a prompt for testing, not a diagnosis. Darkening after trauma sometimes lightens again on its own, especially in baby teeth, and yellowing usually indicates a living pulp. Only the combination of tests, tracked over time, settles the question.

“Once the splint is off, recovery is over.” Splint removal marks the end of the shortest phase. The visits that catch resorption and late necrosis come afterward, at three months, six months and one year.

“A root canal means the tooth has failed.” For a replanted or intruded mature tooth, early root canal treatment is the planned step that protects the root. It is part of a good outcome, not evidence of a bad one.

“Antibiotics prevent the tooth from being lost.” Antibiotics may be advised after replantation to lower infection risk, but they do not make a dried-out ligament grow back. Time out of the mouth and storage conditions matter more than any medication.

Questions to ask your care team

Dental trauma appointments move quickly, and the person most able to protect a tooth over the next year is usually the patient or parent, not the dentist. A few well-aimed questions at the first and second visits make that job easier.

• Exactly which injuries were found, and on which teeth? Ask for the names, and write them down; they determine everything that follows.
• Is the root of this tooth fully formed? This single fact changes whether the team will watch the pulp or plan early root canal treatment.
• How long will the splint stay on, and what should I do if it comes loose or breaks before then?
• What is the full follow-up schedule, and which of those visits include x-rays?
• What early changes should bring me back before the next scheduled visit?
• How should I clean around the splint, and for how long should I use any rinse you recommend?
• When can I return to normal eating, and when can my child return to sport? Is a custom mouthguard advisable?
• If the tooth is a baby tooth, how will you monitor the adult tooth developing beneath it?
• If the pulp does not recover, what are the treatment options, and how urgent would the decision be?
• If the tooth eventually cannot be kept, what would the longer-term plan look like, and does it depend on my child’s growth?
• Should I be seen by a specialist in root canal treatment or in children’s dentistry at any point?
• Is there anything about my general health or medicines that affects how this injury will heal?

Bring the answers to every subsequent visit. A written baseline, particularly of splint dates and the first test results, lets any dentist you see later pick up the thread without repeating work or missing a trend.

When to call your doctor

Most of dental trauma recovery happens quietly between scheduled visits, but certain changes should prompt a call to your dentist the same day rather than a wait for the next appointment.

• Increasing pain, throbbing or a tooth that becomes tender to touch after having settled.
• Swelling of the gum, cheek or lip, or a small bump on the gum near the injured tooth that drains fluid or pus.
• A tooth that becomes loose again after being stable, or a splint that has broken or detached from any tooth.
• A tooth that darkens noticeably or turns grey.
• A bad taste or smell from the area, or fever without another explanation.
• A tooth that appears to be sitting higher or lower than its neighbors, or a bite that no longer meets evenly.
• Numbness of the lip or chin that persists beyond the anesthetic wearing off.

Seek urgent medical care, not just dental care, if the injury was accompanied by loss of consciousness, vomiting, confusion, a severe or worsening headache, difficulty opening the mouth, bleeding that will not stop with firm pressure after fifteen minutes, or difficulty breathing or swallowing. A dental injury with any of these features is a head or facial injury first.

A fragment of tooth that cannot be found after a fall, especially in a child, should also be mentioned; it is occasionally embedded in a lip wound or, rarely, inhaled, and an x-ray can settle the question.

None of these signs means the tooth is lost. Each is a reason to bring the next check forward so the team can test, image and act while options remain open. When in doubt, the sensible move is to call and describe what you see; the treating team decides what it means.

Frequently asked questions

How long does a traumatized tooth take to heal?

Ligament and gum heal within a few weeks, bone within months, and the nerve’s fate may not be clear for a year or more. IADT guidelines reflect this with splint times of two to four weeks, x-ray checks at three and six months, and monitoring for at least a year, extending to five years for replanted teeth. Comfort returning early is encouraging but does not end the monitoring period.

What qualifies as dental trauma?

Any force injury to the teeth, supporting bone or surrounding gums and lips qualifies. That includes chipped or fractured crowns, cracked roots, teeth that are tender or loose after a blow, teeth pushed out of position in any direction, teeth knocked out completely, and fractures of the bone holding several teeth. Even an injury that looks minor deserves a baseline exam, since nerve damage is often invisible at first.

Tooth splint how long is normal after a knocked-out tooth?

About two weeks is the usual splinting period for a replanted permanent tooth, using a thin flexible wire bonded to neighboring teeth. Longer or rigid splinting is not favored because it is associated with more fusion of tooth to bone. If the tooth still feels loose at the removal visit, the dentist may leave the splint in place a little longer and recheck.

What is root resorption after trauma and can it be stopped?

Root resorption is the breakdown of root structure by the body’s own cells. The infection-related type follows a dead pulp and can often be halted by root canal treatment, especially when started early. Replacement resorption, where bone fuses to and slowly replaces the root, cannot be reversed, but it progresses slowly and the tooth commonly remains functional for years while long-term plans are made.

What does knocked out tooth recovery look like long term?

It depends largely on how long the tooth was dry before replantation. With a short dry time, the ligament often reattaches and the tooth behaves nearly normally. With a long dry time, bone typically fuses to the root; the tooth stays firm and comfortable but is gradually replaced over years. Either way, yearly checks continue for at least five years to track changes on x-rays.

Are there updated guidelines for dental trauma?

The International Association of Dental Traumatology publishes the guidelines most dentists follow and revises them periodically as evidence accumulates. The core recommendations in the current version, including short flexible splinting, early root canal treatment for high-risk mature teeth, not replanting baby teeth and long structured follow-up, have been stable across recent revisions. Ask your dentist which version their protocol is based on.

Why does my tooth not respond to the cold test after injury?

A pulp that has been jolted often stops responding to cold for weeks or months even when it is alive, because the nerve fibers are stunned or the blood supply is temporarily reduced. Dentists therefore never diagnose nerve death from a single negative test. They repeat it over several visits and combine it with color changes, tenderness and x-ray findings before deciding whether treatment is needed.

What is a normal traumatized tooth healing time for a child's baby tooth?

Baby teeth are usually managed conservatively and left to settle over a few weeks, with checks at roughly one week, six to eight weeks and then as the adult tooth approaches eruption. Discoloration in a baby tooth is common and often fades. The main concern is the permanent tooth developing underneath, which is monitored until it appears; splinting and replantation are generally not used for primary teeth.

Can a badly decayed tooth be saved, and is it handled like a traumatized tooth?

Decay is a different problem from trauma, but the question is similar: is there enough sound tooth structure above the bone to rebuild, and can the pulp be treated or is it already lost? A dentist assesses this with x-rays and an exam. Some heavily decayed teeth can be restored after root canal treatment; others cannot. The decision depends on the individual tooth and rests with the treating dentist.

What should I do if the splint breaks or comes loose before the removal date?

Call your dentist the same day. A splint that has detached from one tooth may no longer be holding the injured tooth still, and re-bonding it is usually quick. Until you are seen, keep to soft food, avoid biting with the front teeth and do not try to press the tooth back into place yourself. Bring the dates of the injury and splint placement to the visit.

References

• MedlinePlus: Broken or knocked out tooth
• NHS: Knocked-out tooth
• PubMed: International Association of Dental Traumatology guidelines for the management of traumatic dental injuries: 2. Avulsion of permanent teeth
• PubMed: International Association of Dental Traumatology guidelines for the management of traumatic dental injuries: 1. Fractures and luxations

This article is for general information only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Please consult a qualified doctor about your individual situation.