Home Care Instructions After Your Child's Tooth Extraction

What to expect after your child’s tooth extraction at Children’s Dentistry of Westerly and Wakefield:

• Your child will experience numbness in the area of the extracted tooth for up to a few hours. Your child must be careful not to bite on their tongue, lip, or cheek. Please remind them not to do this. They also should not eat during this time since they are very prone to accidentally bite on their tongue, lip, or cheek.
• Gauze was placed in the extraction site to limit the bleeding. Please keep this in place for 10 minutes. Do not let your child chew on this.

What to expect once you get home after your child’s tooth extraction:

Bleeding:

• There may be some bleeding after the gauze is removed. If so, fold a new gauze into a pad thick enough to bite on. Place it directly in the extraction site and have your child bite on it. Have them keep this in place with biting pressure for 10 minutes.
• If heavy bleeding continues, please contact our office.

Swelling and Pain:

• Your child may have some minor swelling at the extraction site. Ice applied to the area can limit this.
• If your child has minor discomfort, you may give them their normal ibuprofen (motrin or advil) dose. If pain is prolonged or severe, please contact our office.

Diet:

• After the extraction, have your child drink lots of liquids and eat soft, nutritious foods. Avoid small, hard foods (nuts, popcorn, etc.) for three days.
• Do not let your child drink from a straw for 3 days as it can disturb the blood clot.

Rinsing and Oral Hygiene:

• Your child may gently rinse with warm water after meals to keep food particles out of the extraction site.
• You may begin gently brushing your child’s teeth according to your normal routine tomorrow.

Office Phone Number: (401) 596-8720

**After Hours Emergency, call our office phone number and follow the prompts to reach one of the doctors.

And remember…  put the tooth under the pillow tonight for the tooth fairy!!