Prevention advice
Your dentist will give you advice on how to prevent dental disease at your routine dental appointment. This might include advice on diet, showing you how to clean your teeth and how to stop smoking.
Hygiene treatment
Routine hygiene treatment is unlikely to cause any bleeding problems. But if your gum condition is poor and you need a local anaesthetic before your dentist cleans under the gums you might need to be referred to the hospital.
Removable dentures
Making and fitting dentures to replace missing teeth can safely be done by your local dentist.
Repairing teeth
Repairs might involve fillings, crowns or bridges to replace missing teeth. Your local dentist can do some of these treatments but it will depend on the type of local anaesthetic injection you need.
Removal of teeth and surgery
Tooth removal or surgery usually needs to be carried out in a dental hospital or hospital dental department so that you can have treatment beforehand to limit bleeding afterwards. This would be arranged by your dental and haemophilia teams. Avoid rinsing and spitting for up to 24 hours after having a tooth out to avoid dislodging the clot. Tranexamic acid can be used if bleeding persists.
Local anaesthesia and injection
Some injections can cause bleeding. They should therefore be done in a dental department or hospital. Others can be safely done by a local dentist.
Tooth implants
Implants are not available on the NHS, so it is prohibited to have NHS and private treatment concurrently for the same condition, regardless of what it is, so it doesn’t only apply to dentistry.
It’s a little unfortunate but implants are not included as the accepted standard of care in the NHS as they are so expensive and simply insufficient resources in the NHS to justify high-cost treatment when more straightforward options for tooth replacement are available.
Implants are available on the NHS for patients with significant loss of teeth/function through cancer surgery and trauma.