[Peggy]

Originally Posted by MyPemCharlie

As many of you have read, Charlie went to the vet Monday to have his two lower retained baby canine teeth surgically pulled. The adult teeth had erupted "base narrow", essentially inside the baby teeth and under his tongue. Initially the vet had said not to worry about any retained teeth until he was 7 months old when they would want to pull any "hangers on". Because the adult teeth were starting to get quite large (and the babies weren't loose), I had the baby teeth pulled. The vet said that they should have pulled them at least a week or two earlier. So much for "don't worry".

The result of waiting too long to have retained teeth pulled, is that the adult teeth may not move into the proper position and end up growing into the roof of Charlie's mouth (creating a huge mess with his sinuses, not to mention making it difficult to eat). They call the dental misalignment a malocclusion. I call it a potentially huge headache. If the teeth don't move, the options are to have the teeth filed down, root canal and capped; have an orthodontist make an incline plane (orthodontic plate); or have the adult teeth pulled.

There is some hope. Since I didn't take the vets initial advice to wait 7 months, Charlie's teeth still have some chance of moving. With a little help. I've done some reading and may be able to help his teeth move with a little rubber ball. The technique is to find a hard rubber round or oval "toy" which is only slightly larger than the distance between the narrowly-set teeth. That is about 3/4" in Charlie's case. Then get the dog to chew on it for at least 15 minutes, 3 times a day. The ball is suppose to apply enough outward pressure on the canines to slowly move them into position. Supposedly there is about a 75% success rate in dogs under 7 months old.

Great. Sounds good in theory right? How about practice? I took Charlie to the pet store yesterday. Do you think we could find a 3/4" ball (about the size of my thumb print)? We even looked a parrot and ferret toys. The smallest balls I could find were some 1" cat toys in a bag of 6. We also bought a puppy Kong, the small end is slightly over and inch. Anyway, we picked up about $30 in balls and toys which had small round ends. None of them are as small as recommended for success. OK, so how to get your dog to chew for 15 minutes, with his canine teeth (not his molars), and not swallow the ball??? Especially when you've taught bite inhibition, and now you have a tiny ball between your fingers, saying "bite down". LOL

All I could think to do is tie several of the cat toy balls into a sock with several knots and play some tug of war (which I'm not sure is accomplishing the goal). I've been dipping the other toys into watered-down "thin" peanut butter trying to get him to bite with his front teeth while I hold the other end of the toy.

Does anyone have any better ideas on how to implement this "treatment"? Also, anything you can think of that is hard rubber and 3/4"? I'm still inclined to tie anything that small into a sock or fabric, as I'm pretty sure he would swallow it otherwise.

You know I think I'd talk to the orthodontist, is there a chance that bands might help. I've heard of those being used on dogs. I'd see about that maybe.

And I think the kong would be a good idea. I too would be worried about him swallowing a small ball.

Peggy