Natal teeth: report of two cases

Abstract

Presence of teeth at birth or within a month post-delivery is a rare condition. We report here 2 cases to highlight their clinical features and discuss their possible treatment. A 7- days old female newborn with two mandibular central incisors, noticed by the parents at birth, with complaint of continuous crying, inability to suck milk and causing discomfort to the mother. The left incisor was highly mobile justifying its extraction. The second case was a female newborn referred 2 hours after delivery, for a brownish highly mobile mandibular incisor noticed by the pediatrician. Extraction was immediately made to avoid the danger of aspiration. This phenomenon can lead to complications either local such as pain on suckling or general such as undernutrition or asphyxia by aspiration. The decision to maintain or remove these teeth should be assessed in each case independently, based on degree of mobility and interference with breastfeeding.

Keywords

• natal tooth
• extraction
• case report