Missing Teeth / Hypodontia Sources of Treatment

monkeyspanner

My daughter was diagnosed with a number of missing adult teeth (hypodontia / partial anodontia) at age 7 and referred to our local dental hospital in Wales. She is now 18 and apart from some temporary cosmetic veneers to build up milk teeth has had no orthodontic or other dental treatment.

She has managed to keep most of her milk teeth in the positions where her missing adult teeth should be and in a couple of places has both adult and milk teeth are present.

Her consultant has up to now advised us to wait until her growth has stopped before contemplating implant treatment and we are assuming that as she is 18 the time has come to plan treatment.

She qualifies for NHS funded implants as she has more than 6 adult teeth missing but the hospital seems reluctant to start planning what treatment is necessary.

Our financial concerns are:
- Is the hospital's reluctance due to the high cost involved?

- Are we going to be forced to go private and pay for implants?

- We would like to take a second opinion but this will mean probably going to a specialist hospital in England. Due to the devolution of the NHS in Wales, getting treatment in England requires an agreement from the local health board (Welsh version of PCT's) to provide exceptional cross border funding. Our dentist has tried to refer us to a dental hospital in London, their initial response was yes but only one consultation but they have refused to see us at all as we live in Wales. We are unclear if this is to do with funding but suspect it may be.

- Our daughter is applying for University places this year to start in Oct 2011, it seems likely she will end up attending a university outside Wales. We have been advised to keep our daughters address as ours as she will be removed from our hospital's list if she says she lives in her University city

If you have got this far, thanks for continuing to read this thread.

Naturally we are very concerned that the NHS will not deliver a timely treatment plan. We have been trying to clarify the situation but it seems almost impossible to find the right NHS department to give us information. Any help or information about NHS dental treatment funding or good treatment options/locations for our daughter would be much appeciated.

welshdent

I suspect you are in Cardiff seeing as that's the only dental hospital we have. Quickly as i am on
My phone - i know a few of the consultants on the hypodontia clinic and have in the past observed some and can safely say NO financial implications do not bias their treatment plans in cases such as this. If they said they think it's necessary they will do it and rest assured the guys doing them are excellent. That's not to say it's going to be done in a time frame you are happy with but thu can not control that. Your daughter isn't the first person to have a university issue cropping up so yes maintain the address as it is. You would only need to go private if you choose to. I advise patience and trust the consultant. If you have any concerns ask them at your daughters review vist

brook2jack

18 is still at the bottom end of the acceptable age to start implant treatment.

If she still has the baby teeth ( and some people can retain them until their 40s or 50s) there is no immediate hurry particularly if she looks ok at the moment.

The other difficulty is there may not be sufficient bone for implants and if she needs multiple implants and grafts they may well want to wait a few years anyway.

The best thing as Welshdentist says is to ask at review. Implants will be a long and time consuming process and there is little point seeking a second opinion at an English hospital unless you are prepared to make many, many ,many visits there to complete treatment and I suspect the reason the London hospital would not see you was not to do with funding but with the difficulties of providing complex treatment requiring many visits over an extended period for someone who lives so far away.