Ask the Frenchie Vet - Preventative Orthodontics on Puppy
lorihuntdvm July 23rd, 2008
have a 10 1/2 week old french bulldog. He has a reverse scissor bite but I noticed that his top teeth are digging into the back side of his bottom gums. Have you seen this before? I have talked to two different vets. One said to pull the teeth and that there was a 50% chance that the adult teeth would grow in normal (don’t really understand how pulling the teeth would affect the adult teeth). The other said that since there is no inflammation and that it doesn’t seem to be bothering him then we don’t need to pull them and just hope that the gums/jaw will adjust as he grows to accommodate the top teeth.
What do you think? Have others had this issue and what have they done?
Dr. Lori writes -
Pulling baby teeth to make room for the adult teeth is known as preventative orthodontics, and can be a very good idea in some cases. I would have to see him to tell you which way to go. If he is not going to be shown, and instead will be neutered, I would wait and watch. He is still quiet young and his bite will do a lot of changing in the next couple of months.
I would say if you still see the issue at 4 or 5 months, to consider pulling them so the adult teeth have a chance to come in in the appropriate positions and not do the same thing as the baby teeth. You could do this at the same time as his neuter.
Dr. Lori Hunt, DVM
Editor’s note: We recently dealt with a similar issue here
