Can you help? I've got lots of questions!!?!

Can you help? I've got lots of questions!!?

I'm 16 and I haven't been to the dentist for a while, probably about 3 years. Now I have what I'm pretty sure are cavities in some of my teeth, and a couple in particular are starting to hurt from time to time. I phoned a dentist today and made an appointment, but it's not for another 6 weeks. I have a few questions:

1. When I see the dentist, will he take care of the teeth that are hurting there and then or will I need to schedule another appointment?

2. The teeth that hurt, will he need to extract them? I'm really worried that I'll have to have them pulled out :o(

3. What actually happens when you get fillings? I only ever had them once before and it was when I was really young, like 4 years old and I don't remember it.

4. I can see cavities in 5 of my teeth - can they fix them all at once or do I have to keep going back?

5. Can I get white fillings on the NHS? I don't really want people to be able to see them.

Thanks for any information!!

1 month ago
I'm not sure how bad the cavities are, I think one is pretty bad though, it's like a brownish hole in my tooth, it's pretty big and it's kind of rotted away the top of my tooth at the back. So where usually there are like 4 corners on a tooth, on this tooth the two back corners have gone.

My teeth don't hurt all the time, but the one I mentioned is starting to hurt more often now and sometimes it hurts pretty bad. The others only hurt if I eat sweets or drink anything too cold.

OK, I can help with some of your questions, but not all - sorry!

The dentist won't do any fillings or anything on your first visit - it's just a new patient check up and x-rays you'll have done then to determine whether you have any problems and what treatment you need. You'll need to schedule another appointment to have any treatment.

They won't do 5 fillings at once (if that's what you need) - they only usually work on one quadrant on one visit (ie. top left/bottom right etc). So if you have cavities all over, you'll need to keep going back. But if you have a couple of cavities in teeth right next to each other, they will probably do them in one visit.

And no, sorry, you can't get white fillings on the NHS unless it's your front teeth.

Good luck!!!

Just seen your edit - it sounds as though that one tooth is pretty badly decayed, but don't worry - it might still be saveable with a big filling, or you might need to consider a crown for it (basically a tooth shaped mould that fits over the tooth once it has been filled to stop it from breaking - teeth with really big fillings in them can break!). I had to get a crown on one of my teeth, but it's pretty good because it's porcelain and it covers the huge silver filling in my tooth, so it looks a whole lot better than if I just had the filling!