symptoms
Chipped a tooth? Size decides the story.
Chips run a spectrum: a sand-grain edge your tongue found before your eyes did, a visible corner off a front tooth, or a chunk of molar in your palm courtesy of popcorn. Size and sensitivity sort out the urgency, and if the chip came with pain or a visible pink spot in the break, skip to the emergency page and call today.
Triage by size, fixes by page
Tiny and smooth-able: painless, cosmetic, often polished out in minutes, book at convenience, but do book, since chips concentrate stress and like to grow. Visible corner, no pain: bonding territory, usually one visit, covered on the bonding page; save any piece in milk on the off chance it can be reattached. Big break, sensitivity, or a molar giving way over an old filling: crown conversation, this week, cover sharp edges with drugstore dental wax meanwhile.
Whatever the size, chew elsewhere until it's seen. Teeth don't heal; they only recruit repairs.
Questions we hear in the chair
- It doesn't hurt. Can it wait?
- Days, yes; seasons, no. Painless chips still propagate under chewing force, and the small-repair window is the cheap one. A quick look sizes it honestly.
- Will a bonded chip be visible?
- Done carefully, no, resin is layered and matched until the repair disappears. Front-tooth chips are bread-and-butter bonding work.
- Why do my teeth keep chipping?
- Repeat chipping usually has an upstream cause: grinding, a bite that loads edges unevenly, or big old fillings leaving thin walls. Fix the pattern, not just the chips, that's an exam conversation worth having once.
Clinical content reviewed by Dr. Marissa DeAngelis, Senior Dentist.
Serving Crozet for 50+ years. At least two full-time doctors in the building, Monday through Friday. Call for current availability.