It’s hard enough juggling work, school, after school activities, and family time. The last thing you want to worry about is trying to manage orthodontic appointments and school. At E&S Orthodontics, your Phoenix Orthodontist, we understand how challenging it can be to do everything, but we can at least alleviate your fears about absences from school for orthodontic appointments and how it might affect your child.
The importance of Sticking to Orthodontic Appointments
Getting braces is an important investment in your child’s oral health, and like any investment, it requires time and scheduled appointments to achieve the results you were looking for. After the braces are applied, your child will need to meet with the orthodontist for recurrent adjustment appointments every 3 to 8 weeks. It’s extremely important that each appointment is kept to ensure that treatment continues to go according to plan. Studies have shown that sticking to scheduled orthodontic appointments affects the outcome of treatment, the duration and the ultimate end results.
Dealing with the School
We’re aware that some school policies can make it more difficult for patients to miss their classes. The fact is that most schools recognize that some children have valid reasons to miss school, which are referred to as excused absences.
Common Excused Absences include:
- Illnesses
- Counseling appointments or mental health treatment
- A serious illness in the immediate family
- A funeral in the immediate family
- Court appearances that are the result of a personal or family action
- Physical emergency conditions due to severe weather conditions
- Medical, dental, orthodontic treatments/exams with the appropriate paperwork from the doctor
Most health care providers, including orthodontists, will provide their patients will a letter they can give the school to confirm scheduled appointments, which typically only last about 20 minutes (depending on how busy the office is that day).
Something else you should know is that most schools use an absence calculator that calculates whether the child attends 4 to 4.5 hours a day. Anything else is typically considered a wash in most cases. That said, each school is a little different, so ask your school about their exact rules.
Bottom line, we understand how important school is, including the child’s attendance record. We also know that the success of orthodontic treatment depends on routinely sticking to scheduled appointments. The impact of having your child taken out of school for an orthodontic appointment is insignificant and because it’s considered an excused absence it shouldn’t affect their attendance record.
I hope the information we’ve provided here helps take some of the worry out of your busy life. If you have any additional questions, please feel free to contact us today. We’re here to help.
