Approximately 3½% of all children will develop Impacted Canines. It used to be 2% but modern lifestyles are causing them to become more common and some estimates suggest it is now over 6%. Usually it is when one of the upper canines gets jammed between the teeth on either side of it but sometime it gets jammed behind the tooth in front of it or even the central incisor in front of that. Parents may have no prior warning until their dentist notices it, by when it may be too late to avoid surgery.

Many orthodontists extract the premolar behind to make room for the canine to erupt but it often needs pulling down with a chain glued to it and this requires expensive surgery. Canines which erupt behind the incisors in front of them may need exposing by removing the bone around them. This is even more complex and can result in the loss of the canine or an incisor in front. Either way impacted canines can be a major problem. 

Interestingly a survey of an Orthotropic practice found that there was not one impacted canine over a 5 year period when  normal averages would suggest there should have had about 50. This is probably because orthotropics both widens and lengthens the jaws. There is a short video on YouTube (John Mew’s lecture number 4) showing an example. 

(Mew J, & Mew M. Canine impaction: how effective is early prevention? An audit of treated cases. Stoma Edu J. 2015;2(2):114-119).