What to do if you hurt yourself playing sports.

Playing sports can have amazing benefits for your life. It can improve your physical and mental health, give you a chance to be social, and make you part of a community. But there’s also a bad side to Saturday sports, and your after hours dentist knows all about it. Certain sports carry a high risk of dental injuries, and there’s nothing worse than interrupting a game because you get hurt. Fortunately, your dentist can now help with the most common types of sports injuries.

Sports Injuries Statistics

Dental injuries can be both costly to treat and have a variety of implications for the patient. It can affect your financial life and have long term functional and psychological effects. Around 31 percent of the dental injuries in Australia occur during sporting activities, which makes playing sports one of the primary causes of this type of trauma.

According to Dr. Amrinder Oberoi from Paramount Dental Sydney, “Rugby is usually the worst for sports injuries. The most common thing we see is people with a displaced tooth or a tooth protruding through the roof of their mouth.” Almost any sport can cause dental injuries, whether those injuries are caused by contact with other players, such as during rugby, or by accidents. If you suffer a Saturday morning sporting injury, then contact your after hours dentist immediately because there’s a lot they can do to help.

Treating Sporting Injuries

There are several sporting injuries that your dentist can help with. Here are some of the treatments they offer for the most common types of dental trauma:

Cracked Tooth

Whether you have a large or small crack in your teeth, your dentist has treatment options that can help. Even a small crack in your tooth needs to be fixed because over time it will spread and could result in a large part of your tooth shearing off. Depending on the extent of the crack, your dentist can cover it with a crown or veneer. Dental bonding can also be used on small cracks to make the tooth solid and strong again.

Tooth Intrusion

If you’re injured during sports, then your tooth or teeth can get driven back into the jaw. This can be very painful and can result in the loss of the tooth and severe dental trauma. The treatment for this problem depends on the extent of the damage, but usually involves surgical intervention.

Tooth Displacement

Obviously, losing a tooth because of a sporting injury is very serious. If this occurs, your dentist may be able to save it, so pick up the tooth and place it gently back in the socket if you can before making a trip to your after hours dentist. If the tooth is too damaged to be put back in your mouth, ask your dentist about dental implants. It’s important that you don’t just leave the gap as it is because this will cause bone loss and affect the placement of other teeth.

Avoiding Sports Injuries

According to Dr. Amrinder Oberoi, “The best advice is to always wear a mouthguard when you play sports.” This is an easy and simple step you can take to safeguard your oral health and save yourself a trip to your after hours dentist. A mouthguard is a protective device that covers your teeth and gums and protects them from impact. Unfortunately, too many people skip wearing their mouthguard when they need to, and even more sportspeople don’t know that they should be wearing them! Mouthguards should be worn when taking part in sports such as:

Basketball
Boxing
Hockey
AFL
Rugby
Soccer
Squash
Cycling
Martial arts
Racquetball
Skateboarding
Rollerblading
Surfing
And more…

If you play a lot of sports, then it’s usually best to get a custom designed mouthguard from your dentist. It will fit better than one-size-fits-all options which means you’ll be more likely to wear it when you need to. It’s also important that you get your children fitted for mouthguards if they play sports as well. If they have a mouthguard that fits properly and is comfortable, they’re more likely to use it. And this will save you the cost of a traumatic and expensive trip to your after hours dentist.

Emergency Dentist Sydney Says:

If you have an infected tooth or other dental emergency, contact our Emergency Dentist in Sydney. Our caring and expert staff are available 24 hours a day to help you with all your emergency dental needs.