Emergency Care

True orthodontic emergencies are very rare, but when they do occur we are available to you. As a general rule, you should call the office when you experience severe pain or when you have a painful appliance problem that you can’t take care of yourself. We’ll be able to schedule an appointment or one of our doctors will meet you in our office to resolve the problem if it is a true emergency.

You might be surprised to learn that you may be able to temporarily solve many problems yourself until you schedule an appointment with our office. When working with your appliances, you need to know the names of the parts of your appliances so you are able to identify what part is broken or out of place. After alleviating your discomfort, it is very important to remember that some broken parts of your appliances need to be replaced as soon as possible. And you would still need to call our office as soon as possible to schedule a time to repair the problem. Allowing your appliance to remain damaged for an extended period of time may result in disruptions in your treatment plan.

The following solutions may help you relieve your discomfort:

Poking Wire

Using a pencil eraser, push the poking wire down or place wax on it to alleviate the discomfort.

Loose Bracket

If your bracket comes loose this is not an emergency. If it is not bothering you, leave it alone and we will determine if it needs to be replaced at your next visit. Or we will simply wait until we have additional brackets to replace. There are enough brackets holding the wire in place, so even if one or two brackets came off the wire would still stay in place. If the bracket is sliding on the wire and bothering you, use a pin or a toothpick and remove the colored or gray elastic, turn the bracket over and remove it from the wire, and throw it away.

Loose Band

If a band comes loose or off, save it and call our office as soon as possible to have it replaced.

Loose Wire

Using a tweezers, try to place your wire back into place. If doing this and using wax doesn’t help, as a last resort use a small fingernail clipper to clip the wire behind the last tooth to which it is securely fastened. If your discomfort continues, place wax on it and call our office during normal business hours to have it replaced.

Loose Appliance

If your appliance is poking you, place wax on the offending part of your appliance.

Headgear Does Not Fit

Sometimes headgear discomfort is caused by not wearing the headgear as instructed by your orthodontist. Please refer to the instructions provided by your orthodontist. If the facebow is bent, please call our office for assistance. Surprisingly, the headgear may hurt less if it’s worn more, so be sure you’re getting in the prescribed hours.

General Soreness

When you get your braces on, you may feel general soreness in your mouth and teeth may be tender to biting pressures for three to five days. Taking Advil or Motrin to relieve the discomfort, which ever you would normally take for a headache. Tylenol does not have an anti-inflammatory so it is less effective in relieving the discomfort.

The lips, cheeks, and tongue may also become irritated for one to two weeks as they toughen and become accustomed to the surface of the braces. You can put wax on the braces to lessen this. We’ll show you how!

If you are interested in emergency care in Suffolk County Long Island or Port Jefferson, Shirley, and Wading River New York, feel free to call the numbers below.