Kids Braces

Sandyford

For full treatment, usually eleven to thirteen, once most of the adult teeth are through. That is when braces can align the whole arch rather than working around baby teeth that are about to fall out.

Some problems are better treated earlier, roughly eight to ten, and a few are better left until growth has finished. There is no single right age, which is exactly why assessment at seven and monitoring afterwards works better than picking a birthday.

Almost everything, with a little adjustment. Soft food for the first few days after fitting, then back to normal apart from the hard and sticky list.

The habit worth building is cutting things up rather than biting into them with the front teeth. Apples, pizza crusts, baguettes and corn are all fine off a fork.

Broken brackets add appointments and add time to treatment, so this is worth taking seriously rather than testing.

It depends on what your child actually needs. A single-arch early correction and a full two-arch treatment run over two years are very different pieces of work.

Most parents spread the cost monthly, interest free, across the treatment. There is a discount for settling the fee in full at the start, and orthodontic treatment qualifies for 20% tax relief through the MED 2 form.

You will get a written plan with a firm figure after the assessment, covering the appliance, every appointment including emergencies, and the first set of retainers.

Most comprehensive treatments run eighteen months to two years. Simpler cases finish sooner, and a short front-teeth course such as Braces Lite is usually six to nine months.

What sets the timescale is how far the teeth have to move and whether the bite needs correcting, not which appliance is used. Cases involving jaw surgery run longest, two to three years across the whole course.

You will get a realistic estimate at your consultation rather than a best-case one.

Rarely full braces, and almost never the full set. At seven there are still baby teeth in place, so treating the whole arch makes no sense.

What a seven-year-old can have is limited early treatment where there is a clear reason: a palatal expander for a narrow upper jaw, correction of a crossbite causing the jaw to shift, or protecting a badly protruding front tooth.

Most seven-year-olds we see need nothing at all yet, and we simply keep an eye on how things develop.

An assessment is the only reliable way, but there are things parents notice: teeth coming through crowded or twisted, front teeth that stick out or do not meet, a jaw that shifts to one side when biting, difficulty chewing, or baby teeth lost much earlier or later than expected.

Thumb sucking continuing past five or six is worth mentioning too.

None of those automatically means treatment. They mean it is worth having someone look. Book a consultation at our Dundrum clinic.

If there is a clinical reason, yes, and the health argument is stronger than the appearance one. A bite that does not fit together wears teeth unevenly and is harder to clean for the rest of their life.

What matters as much is whether your child is on side. Treatment runs eighteen months to two years and depends on them cleaning properly and, for some appliances, wearing them consistently. A child who has been pushed into it tends not to do either.

We talk to the child as well as the parent at the consultation for that reason.

Most children finish in eighteen months to two years with full fixed braces.

Early treatment with an expander or a functional appliance is shorter, often nine to twelve months, though a second phase with braces usually follows once the adult teeth are through.

Two things lengthen it: broken brackets from hard or sticky food, and appliances not being worn. Neither is inevitable, and we will tell you honestly at each visit how it is tracking.

The first week, without much competition. The teeth are tender for three or four days after fitting, and at the same time the lips and cheeks are getting used to the brackets.

After that it gets easier. Adjustments cause a day or two of tightness rather than the same soreness, and by a few months in most people barely notice them.

The end is straightforward. Taking braces off is not uncomfortable.

Every six to eight weeks for fixed braces. The appointments are short, usually around twenty minutes, and mostly involve changing the wire and the elastics.

Aligner reviews are less frequent, every eight to ten weeks. Appliances such as expanders are seen more often at the start while they are being adjusted.

We do our best to work around school where we can, so ask reception when you book.

Not painful, but the teeth are tender for three or four days after fitting and again briefly after each adjustment. Soft food and ordinary paracetamol or ibuprofen handle it.

The other thing children notice in the first week is the brackets rubbing the inside of the lip. Orthodontic wax sorts that, and the tissues toughen up quickly.

Telling a child what to expect beforehand makes a real difference to how they cope with the first few days.