Whats New in the Benefits of Restoring Primary Teeth?

Primary teeth erupt between the age of 6 months and 3 years and gradually exfoliate when permanent teeth replace them between the age of 6 and 12 years. A traditional assumption has been that primary teeth with carious lesions should be restored by removing infected tissue and replacing it with appropriate dental material. This practice, however, has been questioned recently. In developing countries, there have been no resources to treat primary teeth other than by extraction when pain and/or infection occurs. In industrialized countries, the treatment of primary teeth is commonly provided when a child has a mixed dentition (both primary and permanent teeth). Yet early childhood caries, at the age of 3-5 years, is still very common, e.g. in Kuwait 32.4% of 3-year-olds have caries.