milk teeth roots

[Jane1]

My son is 14 years old and he has some broken down milk teeth roots still remaining in his mouth. His dentist says that eventually they will just disappear by themselves but he will be 15 years old in a couple of months and I am concerned that these milk teeth roots still have not disappeared. I am worried that they will become infected and these roots will cause problems for him in future. Should my sons milk teeth roots be removed now?

[Dr Vahid Motahar]

Hi,

Thank you for your question.

Root of the deciduous teeth are naturally resorbed by the body when the adult teeth are coming through. In effect this is one of the ways that body becomes very environmentally friendly!! Therefore as the root of the deciduous teeth are resorbed, the minerals gets used and recycled by the body for various uses which even include making of the adult tooth that is coming through and its completion in structure (Isn't this amazing!?).

Now in a case where this resorption is not complete and some remanent of the deciduous tooth root remains, if body itself does not repel them, then you can consider removing them by dentist to minimize the risk of infection developing as you indicated yourself. We would be happy to see yo and assess the situation in a dental examination.