Dental infection primary teeth

[noojass]

My 5yo fell onto her face 6months ago and her front top tooth went grey. Paediatric dentist saw her and said tooth was alive and to leave be and has been well with no pain or swelling.
For the past 24 hours she has had toothache worse with pressure/eating but no analgesia required. Dentist review and xray showing some lucency around the primary tooth root that is new compared to 6m ago.
Dentist advises extraction and that can safely wait for this but appt is >6 weeks away.
This seems a long time to leave infection grumbling. Am I right to be concerned? I worry the infection may progress/become a large abscess or track to surrounding structures. Also could it cause damage to the adjacent and unerupted permanent tooth if left that long?
Any advice would be much appreciated.

 

[Dr M]

Good day

Usually the dentist would have prescribed antibiotics to control the spread of the infection. If you are worried, phone around and see if you can get an appointment earlier somewhere else.

 

[MattKW]

Kids often whack their front teeth like this in the toddler stage (2-3 years old). The greyness indicates death of the pulp ("nerve"), but because no germs got in, the body tolerates it quite well and extraction is often not needed. However, moving on to 5-6 years old, and the adult teeth have moved down and eaten away some of the baby tooth root. This allows more of the dead nerve to interact with the body, and a full defense starts up; an extraction is required, often followed soon afterwards by the adult tooth coming through a bit early. The adult tooth will be undamaged.
Also, these situations are sometimes a bit tender, but the pus may burst through the thin bone in a child (a gumboil), and the pain is relieved. It is rare in children for an abscess of a front tooth to develop into a nasty situation. Antibiotics are a last resort IF: it swells up significantly, she starts getting more serious pain, and you can't get into a dentist. Taking them now when the appt is 6 weeks away will achieve nothing.