Saving a Lost Tooth

A weird and rare incident happened on last Sunday night...

Within a short 12-hour time, my mood swing from the lowest to the highest. And now, all I can feel is the deepest relief for the bad things that happened, but nothing is really that matter at the end.


On Sunday night, husband was teaching son a simple mathematics rules to do his homework. No matter how husband tried, son didn't seem to get it registered into his brain. Out of the frustration, husband pushed son's head a little bit. Son tried to avoid that automatically, and he knocked his mouth on the edge of the dining table.

Hearing a loud cries, I rushed out from the bedroom. Boy, I was stunned to see son's mouth was full of blood, and the tooth that next to the upper front teeth had fallen out. After stopped the bleeding, the first thing that came to my mind was : That's his permanent tooth, and he lost it !!

I remember I had jotted down his permanent dentition record in his blog , so I quickly log in to check for it. Sure, my record said that it's one of his permanent teeth. He just got it changed since Jan-2008! My heart sinked to nowhere, felt so helpless at that time.

Guilty as hell, husband kept apologizing to the crying son. While I was busy pacifying the crying son and later, tucked both of them to sleep, husband searched the internet, hoping to find a piece of information that could save the lost tooth. 30 minutes had passed since then.

When I finally made them to sleep, husband said he found some information about saving a fresh lost tooth. He said we must soaked the tooth in saline water or milk to preserve the roots, said there is a high possibility we could save it. He then rushed out to the nearby 7-11 convenient shop to buy a packet of fresh milk, and I continued to read the information that he had found, summarized as below :-


Sometimes when teeth have fallen out, they can be successfully replaced. However, there is a time frame that decides if this will be successful and part of it depends on how the tooth is taken care of. Once the tooth has dried out, it is unlikely to reattach. Dentists used to recommend that kids hold a knocked-out tooth in their mouths, but now they don’t due to a choking / swallowing risk. The important thing is to keep the tooth moist but avoid washing or rubbing it. A glass of milk or saline works well for this, as well as pedialyte or gatorade. Try not to touch the root of the tooth. See your dentist as soon as possible, preferably within an hour.


Before husband returned with milk, I called the GH emergency ward to check if there is any dentist on duty. Too bad, they said no dentist was on standby at that late Sunday-night. Somehow, the lady asked us to take the son over so that they could have a preliminary check on him. Having some hopes now, we soaked the tooth in a small bottle filled with milk, then husband woke up the son and they hailed a taxi to go to the emergency ward immediately.

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10 minutes later, husband called. He said the hospital refused to call back the dentist for the incidence like this one. Knowing that we were racing with time, he didn't argue more, but asked me to call another nearby private hospital. I did, and the lady warned me of the steep charged they would impose on me if I wanted to call back a dentist to help us, i.e. HKD2000, exclusive other examination charges, etc. Shark !

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I called husband to tell him this, but he asked me to wait for a while cause he was checking with another source at that time. 5 minutes later, husband told me he had contacted a nurse who worked in a nearby clinic (although the clinic was closed, a nurce was still there to answer the phone, miracle), and she told him we could try to put the tooth back in its place as soon as we could. That's basically what a dentist will do, and all he can do!

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Finally they were back home. Another 30 minutes had passed. Looking at the tooth, fearing that we might damage the tooth or screw up anything, we really had no guts and confindence to do it by ourself. Out of desperation, we searched the internet again to see if we can find any dentist's on line that can provide instant advice. Lucky we, we found one. By swiping our visa card to pay USD9, we got a quick reply from Dr Behere.

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Well, that's it. All we need to do was to replant the tooth back to its socket. I took out the tooth from the milk, and carefully place it to son's mouth. We kept son to stay awake for some time, before we think it's ok to let him to go to sleep. Worried that he might swallow the tooth when he asleep, we put a gauze to let him bite on it. The time was almost 12 midnight by then.

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I couldn't sleep well with a hanging heart. I set the alarm clock at every hour to check on him. Frankly speaking, I felt the chances that we could save his lost tooth was slim cause it had fallen out several times before he went off to sleep. Husband didn't want to rest at all, he kept searching the internet for the best option in case the attempt failed.

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It was about 3pm that husband came in to the bedroom, and told me everything that he found. Just then, son pushed our door, and said the tooth had fallen out again. We took him to the bathroom, and removed the tooth and gauze from his mouth. Sadly to accept, we had to give it up.

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I couldn't sleep well the whole night. I felt so sorry that son had lost his permanent tooth so fast, in such a young age.

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The next morning, I went to work as usual as for every Mondays. Husband didn't go to work, instead, he took son to see the dentist as soon as the clinic is opened. Around 11am, husband called to ask me if I was positively sure the lost tooth is a permanent one? He said when the dentist examined the tooth and his mouth, he think it was still a baby tooth, based on the fact that the lost tooth is small with a very short root. Also, seeing son's lip area was only slight swellen, the dentist doesn't think the force is great enough to cause a permanent tooth fallen out, "chip, maybe, but not fallen out". He said that with over 90% confidence. Anyway, to be 100% sure, the dentist took an X-ray on son's affected area.

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10 minutes later, husband called again to tell me that the dentist had confirmed his diagnose. It was indeed a baby tooth and from the X-ray, husband could see so clearly that the new one, a bigger one, is coming out. The dentist then shake the other tooth that on the other side of the upper front teeth, said that one is a baby tooth too, and it should fall out very soon too. He then asked husband if he wanted to get that baby tooth pull out. Of course husband said no-thank-you.

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My heart was pounding fast when I heard this. OMG, this is indeed the best thing that happen in this year time. Thank you GOD, really, thank you, thank you so much.

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Although we had went through some unnecessary hard time because of the wrong record, the good side is, we knew that a lost tooth can be saved if it is replanted to its place within 90 min time from when it falls out. The dentist said the success rate is as high as 80-90%, especially for permanent tooth, since it has a long root.

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Now then, I just feel so glad that I'd made a wrong record in son's blog. Never been that happy for the mistake that I've made.

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