How To Tell When Your Child Has a Dental Emergency Amidst COVID-19

by | Apr 9, 2020 | Dental Questions

Frequently asked dental questions, answered in our blog

We’re going to talk about COVID-19, just because so many things have changed. I want to keep you abreast whether you’re my patient or not. I really just want to let you know what we’re doing as far as making sure that we’re safe, and making sure that YOU stay safe when you visit our office.

And I want to make sure that that if you have any questions that you’re able to answer those questions, well, we’re still only doing emergency cases. That’s by recommendation of the American Dental Association, the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry and the CDC and remember, we’re doing that for two reasons.

First reason is because we’re not sure we’re hoping that we can open around the 30th around the first of May. And we don’t want your children to have to go to the emergency room or to the urgent care. We want to make sure that we serve them in the capacity that we’re supposed to serve them. So we want to make sure that every child gets taken care of, and that we don’t have to unnecessarily take them to the emergency room or to the urgent care.

Tell all your friends if you know anyone who’s having a dental problem that they should see their dentist go to the dentist not to the emergency room. That means…

  • If your child is having any problems with pain
  • If they’re if they’re not able to eat
  • If you notice that there’s any swelling either on the side of their face, inside of their mouth, around the tooth, or their gums that are swollen
  • If there’s anything sharp, such as when some teeth crack and cause edges that cut the lips or cheeks
  • And also, for those kids who are little bit older and they’re having trouble with teeth coming in — whether it’s their six year molars or their 12 year molars, or it could be their wisdom teeth
  • Any time that your child is having a hard time with like ear pain or jaws or something like that

If your child is having any of those emergency problems, you should give me a call. Now, the good news is that if you’re not sure if your child needs to come in or not, you should probably give me a call anyway. Now let me tell you why.

We are incorporating teledentistry into our software platform for our office. So that means that I can actually talk to you just like we’ve been talking here and how we’ve been talking to our family and friends for the last 14 days. So teledentistry is a process by which we’re able to connect with you directly. It’s a private line where only you and me will talk.

And we look and we see what we can, and then point you in the right direction (whether you need to see another doctor, like an oral surgeon or an emergency visit with me).

And so that’s all the things that we can do over the phone, or through the video.

So let me tell you how it works because it’s really exciting:

  1. First thing you do is call our office at 336-887-9277 or 336-887-WARR.
  2. Once connected, press the number four. (That comes directly to me as an emergency line.)
  3. Once I receive your call, I’ll send you a link, whereby we’ll be able to confidently chat between the two of us about your child.

The other way that we can connect is for you to visit our Contact Us page.

Fill in the details about your questions or the trouble you’re having, and we’ll get back to you ASAP. If you’re an existing patient with a question, please say so in your message.

As we’re going through this COVID-19 pandemic, I may not be able to put anyone on a respirator, and won’t be able to treat anybody with COVID-19 — at least not at this time.

But I will be able to help your child and help you get through this pandemic without ever leaving the house with the teledentistry solutions mentioned above. You get peace of mind knowing what’s going on, and will know what your next steps should be.

And you get to know that you can sleep throughout the night or if you have any questions, I can answer those for you.

But don’t go to the emergency room or urgent care. In most cases those are unnecessary measures for dental issues and their resources are already strapped as it is. It’s best that we can avoid adding to that burden unnecessarily.

We want to make you make sure that our office is safe, and that our patients’ experiences are as simple and positive as possible. And so we’ve changed a lot of things in the operation of the office. But we want to make sure that we do our part. And I thank you for your patience in allowing us to do what we do. This is what I do. And I thank you for being patient with that process.