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Friday, July 1, 2016
Healthy Mouth, Healthy Kids
Baby teeth missing
My child is 3 and a half year old. I noticed that one tooth did not grow in the upper part (Only nine teeth has grown up). That is why there is a gap between neighboring teeth. What should I do ?
Thank you for the question. While children have a wide range of when teeth come in, it is not uncommon for a child to be congenitally missing teeth.
The best recommendation I could give here would be to have a dentist examine your child. A dentist (one with some experience in treating children) will be able to give you a full discussion on how the tooth should be monitored as well as potentially take radiographs (x-rays) to make sure the tooth is 'missing' and not in fact stuck. I hope this helps.
Sarath Thikkurissy, DDS, MS
Director, Residency Program, Division of Pediatric Dentistry and Orthodontics
College of Medicine
University of Cincinnati