dog dental problems...

hi i have a 3 year old miniature yorkie...

i just noticed today while brushing his teeth that two upper teeth each beside the canine was wabbly...

other teeth seem stable, its just the two upper teeth beside the canine that seems to be unstable, is this a serious problem? if so please give me some advise

small breeds can have a lot of teeth problems..my mom had two italian greyhounds that ended up pretty toothless by their old age. I would check with the vet and make sure all is ok.

yeah last time i went to a vet he warned me that they tend to have bad teeth...i am wondering if the two upper teeth are suppost to be like that but i am guessing not

i had an accident that knocked all my front upper teeth loose..they stayed that for along time. The dentist didn't know if i would lose them or not but they eventually tightened up and 15 years later i still have them. That is another reason to check with the vet..

Teeth are not supposed to be loose unless they are baby-teeth on the way out. Yorkie's I've noticed are prone to dental problems, especially if they aren't "top of the line", though that's not a guarantee by any means.

is there an effective way of curing this or is it best to get the vet to take a look

My god....so happy to see this post. For myself, not the doggy!
I had my front tooth knocked very very lose (it broke actually) but they left it in and wanted to see what would happen. It's been about 9 years since it happened, and I still have nightmares of losing it. I still baby it, and won't bite anything with it. Hearing of somebody else that had this happen and that it's tightened up, is such a relief. As silly as it sounds it causes me a TON of stress.

There is a special suppliment that you should ask your vet about called "Wysom Dental" I know a few older Shelties that are on it and have great teeth!

I am going to the vets tommorow...I'll post what he suggests

if the teeth are loose, there's most likely gum disease that needs to be addressed.

small breeds, and especially very small individuals of these breeds, tend to have genetic problems with teeth to begin with, since abnormally small jaws cause teeth to be crowded.

see what your vet says, but don't be alarmed if he suggests they have to come out.

yeah it seems that its the gums

he's been having bad gum ever since i got him when he was about 2 years old

just wondering, should i try to brush his teeth more than twice a week? I heard that its recommended to brush twice a week but maybe that wasn't enough...

I would expect twice a week to be enough for most but if you are noticing it to be a problem then you may need to increase that a bit. It sounds like it will be an ongoing situation for him based on his age and breed. Like others have said, teeth are not supposed to be loose at his age unless something is causing their decay. Peridontal disease is the most common cause so you probably do need to brush them often. There are some good mouth rinses to help combat that too, they seem to be helpful in dogs that are prone to such problems. Your vet can probably recommend one. Use a very soft brush to brush though, you don't want to aggrivated an already sensitve area.

yeah i feel bad now...it seems i could have done a better job brushing, i did use a soft rubber brush that you put over your finger but i think i sometimes got careless brushing him

i am hoping that the teeth are fixable...if not hopefully the rest of the teeth...

ok the vet told us to make him take antibiotics for a while and that its recommended to do a dentistry on him too...

anyone here have some experience with dog dentistry? he said it could cost as much as 600-800 dollars (canadian dollar) and I want to know if its really worth it or not

Wow, that seems like a lot, I don't know the exchange rate right now but I think it would still be about 400 - 600 american. And I might look for another vet.

I do think antibiotics and a dentistry is warranted but that seems really high.

Yes, he requires anesthesia, they may want to do bloodwork first, they will probably send him home with treatments for you to do at home, maybe even a special diet, they will probably set a catheter and hook him up to IV and monitors during the cleaning. They will probably have a couple extractions, sometimes more than they can tell before they are able to look closely, but still that seems SO high. I guess I would expect to pay $200 or $250 for all that but not more, and maybe less. He is only 3, right?

yeah he is 3

I guess I can ask around at other places for their prices but the vet said that they will need to do anesthesia and probably take out the two wabbly teeth, he didn't tell us more details because my dog has pretty bad temper towards strangers and he couldn't examine him further

he said after anesthesia he'll be able to examine the mouth further and see exactly what he has to do....

I know my dog i had as a child ended up having about half of his mouth absessed by the time he was in his teens. They pulled quite a few of his teeth - but i do not know how much it was. The vet who did it was a friend of my father's so he may nto have charged to have Sparky's teeth pulled. I do know if you allow this to go for too long your dog can get pretty bad.

It's been a long time ago ... one of my older Goldens had a bad molar. I know it was well under $100. I wouldn't think today's prices would be more than a spay/neuter !