Why leave DEAD babytooth alone -- but not cavities?

[Marni]

I'm curious --

Why do dentists choose to just leave a dead baby tooth alone (like when a child falls and a tooth goes brown or grey) -- but they don't choose to leave cavities in baby teeth alone?

Can the latter lead to more serious damage to the permanant teeth than the former?

Are there any studies out there showing that maybe babyteeth don't NEED to be filled when a child has a cavity?

Just curious -- as my 5 year old has a ton of small cavities in between her molars. But I still feel so ignorant about these matters and am having a hard time digging up research.

[dds07]

if at all possible, it is better to keep baby teeth in place because they are natual space holders. you risk losing space for permanent teeth if the baby teeth are lost early or out of sequence. so if a tooth is "dead" but has not abscessed, it is better to leave it in place as a space holder.

cavities in baby teeth, if untreated can become large quickly because the enamel is so thin in baby teeth and can lead to abscesses (infections) in the baby. these can cause permanent damage to the developing permanent teeth, so you want to stop the progression of the cavities.

there are literally thousands of articles. search on www.pubmed.com

[flowmom]

Originally Posted by dds07

cavities in baby teeth, if untreated can become large quickly because the enamel is so thin in baby teeth and can lead to abscesses (infections) in the baby. these can cause permanent damage to the developing permanent teeth, so you want to stop the progression of the cavities.

: Infections can even go into the jawbone and skull . Very scary. Untreated early childhood cavities are also associated with malnutrition and changes in eating patterns due to the child having pain but being unable to communicate about the pain to caregivers . Dd has major dental problems and we are monitoring carefully - we will get filling under GA if we think she's in pain.