Frequently Asked Questions
The Port Pacific Dental team has an open-door policy on questions, so we welcome them and promise to offer the best answers we can.
Here you will find a collection of the most common questions and their solutions.
If you have a question that we have yet to answer here, we encourage you to contact us so we may provide you with an answer and even include it here for other visitors.
We look forward to broadening your knowledge about your dental care.
Other
At Port Pacific Dental, we don’t want financial considerations to get in the way of your essential dental care or your smile goals. So, in addition to standard payment methods such as cash and credit cards, we also offer a number of other options.
Bulk-Billed Child Dental Benefits
Dr Emil Fernando and his team are proud to offer qualified families a range of services covered through the Child Dental Benefits Schedule (CDBS). This program contributes a substantial amount to pay for your child’s dental care needs, such as routine examinations, x-rays, and cleanings. In addition, preventive treatments such as tooth sealants and dental fillings are also covered.
To be eligible, children must be between 2 and 17 years old. Families who meet the requirements may also qualify for other dental benefit schemes.
Other Payment Options for Dental Service in Port Macquarie
Visit our Financial page for a comprehensive list of insurance and other plans we accept. We also offer payment plan options and may serve people with health fund claims and hospital vouchers.
We are excited to service new patients living in the Port Macquarie area, including Sancrox, Thrumster, King Creek, Lake Innes, Lake Cathie, Bonny Hills, Laurieton, Wauchope, Kempsey, Crescenthead and South West Rocks.
Choosing a dentist is a deeply personal decision. After all, your dentist is part of your healthcare team. We welcome your call if you have any questions to help you make a choice you feel comfortable with. Many people search for a dentist near work or home and who is part of the Port Macquarie community.
Beyond convenience, at Port Pacific Dental, many people look for dentists based on the following qualities.
- An emphasis on excellence and continuing education—Our entire team strives for excellence in all areas, and we are always learning about the latest in leading-edge dentistry.
- A focus on patient-centred care—This goes beyond the dental care we provide. We care deeply about our patients as people and treat everyone as if they were members of our own families.
- A positive experience—We work hard to create an atmosphere of comfort at Port Pacific Dental in our modern, clean, state-of-the-art facility. We want you to feel relaxed while you are here.
- A commitment to optimal oral health—Our goal is that you should enjoy healthy teeth and gums and know how to practise good home care.
We recommend dental check-ups and cleans and exams every 6-12 months to ensure your smile’s health stays on course. Without regular cleans and exams, your teeth and gums may not receive the necessary attention to remain healthy and strong.
At Port Pacific Dental, we provide family dentistry in a personable environment at our Port Macquarie dental clinic. Dr Emil Fernando and his team are excited to serve you and your family with high-quality dental services and an individualized approach to oral health care.
Our clinic address:
Shop 4, 19 Warlters Street
Port Macquarie, NSW 2444
You can find us off Warlters Street just west of the Kmart Port Macquarie and next to St Joseph’s Primary. Some nearby points of interest are Livvi’s Place at Westport Park, Settlement City Shopping Mall and across Wright’s Creek from the Port Macquarie coastal walk. Our convenient location is surrounded by shops and restaurants.
Directions to Our Dental Clinic
From central Port Macquarie, the most direct route is Ocean Drive north. Continue on Ocean Drive, crossing the B56, and when Ocean Drive turns west and becomes Hastings River Drive, turn right on Park Street. Follow Park Street to Warlters Street. Turn left on Warlters Street, and our clinic is located on your right.
From areas north of the Hastings River, you may drive south on the Pacific Highway A1, connecting to Hastings River Drive at Blackmans Point Road. Follow Hastings River Drive south, across the river, until you reach Newport Island Road. Turn left on Newport Island Road and then right on Bay Street. Follow Bay Street to Park Street, where you’ll turn right and follow Park Street to Warlters Street.
Welcoming New Patients Searching for a Port Macquarie Dentist
Dr Fernando and the Port Pacific Dental team look forward to meeting you and your family and providing excellent dental care. To learn more about why patients rank Dr Fernando so highly, we welcome your call to set up an appointment today.
General Dentistry
Missing and decayed teeth are pretty common. The average Australian adult has between four and eleven teeth damaged or completely gone. For those with one or more missing teeth, you should recognize the problems caused when you elect not to replace them.
When you lose a tooth or have it extracted in Port Macquarie, the space it once occupied in your jaw is called an empty socket. This leftover space is the epicentre of what happens if you don’t replace a missing tooth.
Empty Sockets Endanger Bone and Gum Health
Because it takes a while for your socket to heal, it can become a place where plaque-causing bacteria can accumulate, away from the cleansing effects of your toothbrush. That bacteria may proliferate and colonize nearby gum tissue, accelerating the effects of periodontal disease.
Your empty socket also impacts your jawbone health because chewing pressure conducted via an intact tooth stimulates bone growth. So while the bone tissue within the socket will eventually regenerate, the lack of pressure will allow your bone density to decrease. As a result, after years, your jawbone may become more slender and prone to fracture.
Adjoining Teeth Placed under Extra Stress
Your teeth work best as a team, each performing a specific task. So if a teammate goes missing, its neighbours are forced to pick up the slack. While you may overlook the impact on your other teeth in the short term, the accumulated stresses can build up over time. We see this, especially with molar and premolar teeth, which do the lion’s share of the work to grind up food.
These added stresses may lead to tooth fractures or uneven wear, but the most severe consequence is that your adjoining teeth may shift towards the gap.
Remaining Teeth Shift into Missing Tooth Space
The most significant threat a missing tooth is to its neighbours is how they naturally will shift into the space. This process may take several years to notice, but the impacts are widespread when it happens. First, your entire bite may become misaligned, harming your jaw joint and leading to painful TMJ disorders and further tooth decay. Next, loosening and shifting teeth are themselves candidates for loss.
Missing teeth ultimately lead to more missing teeth, a cascade of oral health problems that hurts your entire smile. But by replacing missing teeth with Port Pacific Dental, you can simultaneously avoid these pitfalls and enjoy an intact smile.
Our team will make you comfortable and relaxed at your first dental visit to Port Pacific Dental. Dr Emil Fernando will discuss your dental concerns and questions, as well as your needs and expectations.
Then we will gather information from you regarding medical, dental and social history and perform a comprehensive examination. This will include taking x-rays for accurate diagnosis, followed by a complete personalised analysis. Finally, we will explain your recommended treatment options, their pros and cons, and associated costs.
The Advantages of Choosing Port Pacific Dental
Dr Fernando offers dental treatments which consider you as a whole person. His approach has many advantages, including:
- Clear dental explanations using terminology you can understand
- Emphasis on treating dental anxiety on all levels
- Outreach to patients who may feel dental care is beyond their means
- Bulk-billed dental benefit schemes for children, veterans and families in need
- Cosmetic dentistry options are also available
You Decide Which Treatments Are Right for Your Smile
At every step of the process, we discuss any questions you have to ensure you understand all treatment facets to make an informed decision.
We invite families and adults in the Port Macquarie area and Sancrox, Thrumster, King Creek, Lake Innes, Lake Cathie, Bonny Hills, Laurieton, Wauchope, Kempsey, Crescenthead and South West Rocks to contact us to arrange their first dental appointment.
Our dental practice prioritises a gentle approach to enhance your comfort for every treatment. But the vast majority of the time, if you feel dental pain, it’s usually caused by your dental condition, not the cure. So if your toothaches due to an infection that has spread inside your tooth and gums, you feel pain because:
- Your body is signalling that you have a problem
- Inflammation, a natural response to infection, causes pressure on your tooth nerve. That hurts a lot.
- Because infection inevitably spreads, that increase in bacteria further inflames tissues.
Dr Emil Fernando can apply solutions for your dental pain. Though procedures can feel stressful, if you can associate the work with how much it will relieve your pain in the long run, you may even begin looking forward to your dental visits.
Port Pacific Dental Values Pain-Free and Anxiety-Free Dentistry
Another thing that helps us lessen your pain is our extensive experience. This allows us to apply anesthetic effectively and only to the areas we intend to treat. Specific techniques even make your anesthetic injections nearly painless.
We also use the latest technology and offer many options for pain-free treatments. If you’d like to learn more, you may visit our Anxiety-Relief Options page for the full array of services available. We can help make your dental appointments the most positive experience possible in Port Macquarie and beyond.
Cosmetic Dentistry
If you don’t love your smile, but you aren’t sure if there is anything you can do about it, cosmetic dentistry may be an option for you. Gone are the days when you have to accept the way your teeth look. Today’s cosmetic dentistry services are not just for the rich and famous anymore. So, what can cosmetic dentistry in Port Macquarie, NSW, do for you?
What Is Cosmetic Dentistry?
Cosmetic dentistry aims to help you achieve the highest functioning, most aesthetically pleasing smile. We do this by combining various cosmetic services; depending on your dental wants and needs, our team can create a treatment plan specifically designed for your mouth.
What Cosmetic Dentistry Services Do You Offer?
At Port Pacific Dental, we offer a variety of cosmetic dentistry services, including the following:
- Dental implants, dental bridges, dentures and partial dentures
- Traditional braces, as well as Invisalign clear aligners
- Porcelain veneers
- Dental crowns, dental bonding and tooth-coloured fillings
Do You Need Cosmetic Dentistry in Port Macquarie, NSW?
If you or a loved one would like to schedule a consultation to discuss your cosmetic dentistry options, please call us on (02) 5564 1200. A dental team member will be happy to take your call.
Smile Design & Smile Makeover
Did you know you have several cosmetic dentistry options if you are unhappy with your smile? Many people feel that cosmetic dentistry is only for famous people or people with a great deal of money. However, that simply isn’t true. Today’s cosmetic dentistry is for everyone, and you may be surprised at how a smile makeover can transform your look.
What Is a Digital Smile Design?
A smile makeover begins with a digital smile design. We focus on helping you achieve your best smile through several steps. Our digital smile design process is as follows:
- We will sit down with you for a consultation to discuss the smile makeover process.
- Next, we use an intraoral camera to take 3-D images of multiple angles in your mouth.
- Then, we use a digital scanner to send your images to a design team at a famous dental lab. Together with them, we will finalise your smile design.
- Finally, you will approve your cosmetic design. You must be comfortable with every step of the smile design process.
Smile Design in Port Macquarie, NSW
If you want more information about our smile design services, we welcome your call at (02) 5564 1200. At Port Pacific Dental, we want you to love your smile.
Dental Crowns
You may not like your smile for several reasons, but if you have broken or missing teeth, it can affect not only the look of your smile but your dental health as well. At Port Pacific Dental, our goal is to help you achieve a healthy smile that looks beautiful, and dental crowns may be a good option for you.
What Is a Dental Crown?
A dental crown is a tooth restoration that covers your entire tooth to strengthen, stabilise and protect it. Made from a variety of different materials, dental crowns work to help you prolong the life of your natural tooth. The dental team at Port Pacific Dental can talk to you about what type of dental crown may work best for your dental situation.
Why a Dental Crown?
If you have one or more teeth that have been damaged in any of the following ways, you may be a good candidate for a dental crown:
- Cracks
- Fractures
- Chips
- General wear and tear
- Large fillings
- Lost filling
Dental Crowns at Port Pacific Dental
We welcome your call if you or a family member need more information about the dental crown process. If you are in Port Macquarie, NSW, or the surrounding area, call us on (02) 5564 1200.
Emergency Dental Services
A knocked-out tooth is a specific type of tooth damage that requires urgent care. Also called an ‘avulsed tooth’, you’ve suffered this condition when a permanent tooth comes out of its socket entirely but also intact.
Quick thinking and action are vital after a tooth gets knocked out because, in this circumstance, your dentist can save the tooth if you make it to our Port Macquarie dental clinic right away.
Step-by-Step Instructions for a Knocked-Out Tooth
Your main goal between the accident and your emergency dental appointment is to avoid damaging the tooth or the extra-sensitive root tissue. Here are our recommendations in order:
- Handle the tooth by the crown, avoiding contact with the roots.
- If dirty, gently rinse debris from the tooth with warm water – don’t wipe it off or dry it.
- Protect and keep it moist the tooth for transport:
- The best way – Reinsert the tooth into the socket and hold it in place with gauze.
- The next-best way – Hold the tooth in your mouth between your gums and cheek.
- An acceptable way – Place the tooth in a container of saliva or warm milk. Don’t let it bounce around inside the container.
- Call Port Pacific Dental immediately.
If our team can reinsert your tooth within an hour of the avulsion, then we have a good chance of saving it. However, if your tooth has broken into pieces, we can still stabilize your mouth and then offer tooth replacement options, some of which we may apply immediately.
The first thing to do when an accident impacts your teeth or a toothache gets out of hand is to call Port Pacific Dental as soon as possible. We can discuss your situation and help decide if urgent or emergency dental care is what you need.
Many conditions may qualify as an emergency. These include:
- Severe toothache
- Chipped or broken teeth
- A knocked-out tooth
- Missing or broken fillings or crown
- Tooth infection
- Sudden tooth discolouration
- Sensitivity
- Facial and gum swelling
- Denture repairs
- Wisdom teeth problems
- TMJ problems
Some dental emergencies, like a knocked-out tooth, are time-sensitive and need urgent attention. If you can, retrieve your knocked-out tooth and contact us right away. Your tooth might survive if we reimplant the tooth shortly after the incident. However, if too much time passes, successful reimplantation becomes more unlikely.
Many Dental Emergencies Are Preventable
While an auto or sporting accident may come out of the blue, some things that damage your tooth result from neglected maintenance. For example, a small cavity that goes untreated becomes a big cavity. In addition, early-onset gum disease called gingivitis, which is reversible with care, can become a full-blown periodontal disease that can even result in tooth loss.
Whether you need urgent care or want to help eliminate that possibility, we welcome your call to our dental clinic to arrange a dental appointment today.
Anxiety-Free Dentistry
At Port Pacific Dental, we understand how anxiety and fear of the dentist keep many people away from their dentist, sometimes for years. But we also understand how important regular check-ups and cleans are for not only your teeth but for your overall health and well-being. We aim to help you feel completely comfortable and relaxed so you can get the dentistry you need without the stress.
We Start with Positive Relationships
Our dental practice focuses on building a new relationship between you and dentistry on a foundation of positive, personal regard. We will see you as a person first, with unique feelings and experiences. Then, we will spend the time necessary to make you feel at home and earn your trust.
Services to Relieve All Levels of Anxiety
When your dental anxiety is more acute, we are qualified to apply several techniques and treatments. These include:
- Local anaesthetics
- Nitrous oxide ( also called happy or laughing gas)
- Oral or intravenous sedation
- Sleep dentistry
- Twilight sleep and sedation
- Sedation with a qualified sedationist
We are here to serve you with warmth and compassion if you feel any level of stress around dental appointments. You may call us anytime to learn more about how we can keep you safe, comfortable and healthy.
Dr Emil Fernando is a compassionate dentist who truly understands that some people feel anxiety about visits to their dentist. So often, these feelings can be so strong that people avoid the care they sorely need. Treating patients who suffer from dental anxiety is behind our numerous sedation options.
We will evaluate your needs and help you decide which choice is best for you. Our options include:
- Nitrous oxide (relaxing gas sedation)
- Oral medication-induced sedation
- Twilight sleep, twilight sedation
- Sleep dentistry
- Full sedation with a qualified seditionist
Our team will answer all your questions and address your concerns to ensure you feel comfortable and safe throughout your procedures.
How Do Patients Benefit from Sedation Dentistry?
The price of dental avoidance is much higher than the costs of caring for your teeth. This is why numerous patients can take advantage of sedation to complete needed dental procedures. We also may help you choose the level of sedation best for you. For example, nitrous oxide is a mild sedative that takes the edge off of treatments while allowing you to recover quickly and resume your regular schedule.
Other options, like sleep dentistry, are appropriate for those most acutely impacted by dental anxiety. Sleeping through dental procedures such that you wake up with no memory of the ordeal is appealing to many patients. Regardless of your choice, our team will ensure your sedative option is safe and effective.