Doctor Visits

Last week, Ivy had her first Cleft Clinic doctor appointments. She saw an ENT, a speech therapist, educational specialist, oral surgeon, dentist, and a plastic surgeon for her cleft. The speech and educational specialists could not do too much for us at this point. Ivy, of course, needs to go to the dentist to clean those teeth that have never seen a dentist before. The plastic surgeon shared with us all he would be doing to make Ivy's lip look much better. But, that will be when she is around 9 years old. The big thing was the oral surgeon. He is the one that will fix her gumline..the missing bone area in her mouth. Her palate is not affected, which I'm thankful for.

In about a year, Ivy will have surgery on her upper gum area. Dr. P. said he will take some bone from her hip and fill in where she is missing bone in her mouth. Today, Dr. P took that very crooked, loose front tooth out. It caused so much aggravation every time we brushed her teeth. The adult tooth is coming in, but twisted. Her bottom adult teeth are coming in behind her baby teeth. Her mouth is a mess, but it could be worse.

Picture taken with my phone.  Not too clear, but you can see the tears.

Ivy was not very happy about it all.  She seemed okay on the way to the doctor.  But, once in the chair, she started the silent crying.  We initially thought 2 teeth were being pulled, but it ended up being just the one.  She had some gas, and they numbed her gum with a gel, but nothing else.   The tooth was already loose, and Dr. P. quickly pulled it out.  Afterward, Ivy was extremely upset and crying a bit more loudly.  By the time we left, she was fine.  She has to get used to this.  She'll have more teeth removed down the road.  She'll even have to have a fake tooth put in at some point because she is missing one.  It seems like a lot, but it is all spread out over years.  The next step is to visit the ortho in May and see what she recommends.

This looks more line one of Millie's teeth!

The funny thing about it all...Ivy's Chinese medicals did not state that she had this issue.  We knew her lip was affected, but it never mentioned anything else.  So, I thought it was a very minor cleft.  I was wrong.  But, when I traveled to China, I knew that there was a good possibility that this was left out of her medicals.  I'm glad we are able to take care of her and give her the medical attention she needs.