Any Dentists in the house?

[AcesAZ]

Tooth pain question

I know I should probably just call my Dentist but I was wondering maybe someone would know on here. Anyways I had a cavity fall out 2 weeks ago, upper, left, back tooth. Had it redrilled and filled last week. The dentist said it was lucky we caught it in time becasue it was really close to a root canal. Anyways I've had some fairly minor pain that day and it really hasn't gone away yet. Been about a week now. They said I would have some pain but never said for how long. Should I just wait longer to see if it goes away? Do I possibly need a root canal? I don't have insurance either and had to pay cash for the last job. Anyways this sucks!

[Johnnyallthetime]

does the tooth hurt spontaneously for no reason? is it particular sensitive to hot or cold? does it hurt especially when you bite down or chew? does the pain wake you up in the middle of the night? is it a constant throbbing pain? or is it a spontaneous pain that lingers?

 

if it was just a cavity prep that he drilled, it shouldn't still be hurting, especially after a week. there shouldn't be much pain by now unless it's your gums that were hurting from the rubber dam clamp.

 

it's possible that you might need a root canal, but i'd need to do tests on your teeth and x-rays to determine that for sure. if you can answer those questions, i can guess, but without tests and x-rays, it'd just be a guess.

 

just to let you know, if you're planning on saving that tooth with a root canal, it'll probably need a crown as well since there was already a pre-existing restoration on there that had fallen out/cracked. full coverage of the tooth is the best way to preserve the money you put into the root canal. just a heads up in case you're budgeting for the root canal.

[AcesAZ]

It does seem better today. It was just hurting yesterday kind of constant (about 2-3 out of 10 pain, pretty minor) but more so when I drank some cold water (moved to 4 or 5 out of 10). Also the pain only moved up with cold. Doesn't hurt to bite down or anything. Right now I hardly feel it.

[Johnnyallthetime]

if it seems better and there's no spontaneous pain, i'd give it a little more and play it by ear from there. if you have any questions, feel free to PM me. wish you a speedy recovery.

[sharkiesj]

agree with johnny.

 

you shouldn't still have pain after one week if you have a "normal" filling. I say "normal" because we dentist's often-times excavate large areas of decay that comes very, very close to the nerve, then we put down a layer of base, or a calcium hydroxide layer of "protection" on top of the nerve before we put in our filling material. then we adjust your bite and send you away with a warning that the tooth may still be sensitive after a while, but it should calm down in a few days.

 

other things we need to know is if the filling you had was an amalgam(silver filling) or a composite(white filling). composite fillings can be sensitive to people for all kinds of reasons, even if the dentist did a perfect job. the reason is that a composite filling is extremely technique sensitive and you could have 20 dentist's do the same step-by-step technique, and you'll get 20 different reactions by those 20 patients. silver fillings can be sensitive too and if they are very large, they conduct temperature to the nerve of the tooth a lot more than acrylic composite fillings.

 

if it is feeling better and better, i would wait before you go back to your dentist. but if you're still feeling that the tooth is just not right, then go back to your dentist and unfortunately, you're probably looking at a root canal, and then after that a crown to encase the whole tooth to protect it and your investment in the tooth so hopefully you'll get more than 10-15 years of good service out of that tooth.

 

now, here's some terms you should know and understand so if you do go back to your dentist, you can freak him out with all your knowledge.

 

if the tooth is mildly sensitive but generally ok, we label that REVERSABLE PULPITIS. meaning that the pulp(nerve) is being irritated, it can be reversed back to normal if the irritant(hot, cold, pressure) is removed or dealt with. maybe you fall into this catagory. you had work done, the filling was irritating the nerve, but it's getting better as time goes on and the nerve isn't bothering you so much.

 

now, if you're still feeling something there after 1, 2, 3, 4 weeks, then we label that IRREVERSABLE PULPITIS where the nerve continues to cause problems and pain is still being felt. And the only way to really deal with that is to take the nerve out of the tooth(root canal), or extract the tooth.

 

personally, i totally understand your situation financially and i'm always honest with my patients, i do admit to them that it is really expensive for them to save their tooth, esp. without insurance than it is to pull it out. And honestly, if there was a gun put to my head and i had to have a tooth taken out, i would choose the upper last tooth on the top because it has the least impact on your occlusion(bite) if it was missing vs. losing any of your other teeth. if you did choose to take it out, you would lose about 10-15% of your chewing capacity on that side, so its not alot, but it is noticeable. our office charges 925.00 for a molar root canal, and 1100 for a white tooth- colored crown...so for you to save your tooth, you're looking at over 2000 dollars...we also charge 185 dollars to take your tooth out so that's a big financial decision over 1 tooth.

 

the other thing i always tell my patients:

 

look, YOU know your teeth alot more than i do. you know if it doesn't quite feel right, you know if the filling is working or it's not working...if it just doesn't quite feel right, just call us and we'll move toward making it better, be it a root canal or an extraction...if it's feeling good, then everything we did was successful and we hope you get many years of service out of that filling. btw, if the filling didn't work out and the next step is a root canal or an extraction we always apply whatever you paid for the filling towards the root canal or extraction to save you some bucks.

 

lastly, just to confuse you even more, there are two other things i need to discuss with you. one is, if the filling was left slightly high, meaning when you bite down, your bite is "off" where you hit the filling before you hit your teeth on the other side, that can be very painful to the tooth and the filling needs to be adjusted to where your bite feels just like how it did before you had the filling.

 

secondly, and this is the confusing part....you cannot always go by pain if the restoration was successful. often-times what happens is the tooth hurts, then the pain goes away not because the restoration was succcessful, but because the restoration irratated the nerve so bad that it killed the nerve completely and the nerve is completely dead, we call that a NECROTIC NERVE. a necrotic or dead nerve inside a tooth will not hurt you, but it will lead to an abcess where pus and bacteria form inside the tooth and it drains out the end of the roots, causing your face to expand the size of an orange in large abcess's. To guard against this, or check for an abcess, you must take an xray of the whole tooth to see any abcess formation which one can clearly see as a dark circle around the end of the roots in an xray. This is why we recommend seeing the dentist every 6 months for a check up and cleaning so we can catch things like this.

 

i personally think, and this is JMHO, but you are not out of the woods yet with this tooth. as long as it doesn't have a root canal and crown, you are at a slight risk to continue having "problems" and work done on this tooth at some point in the future. it's not a matter of if, but a matter of when. at least that has been my experience in cases where the filling is very, very deep and the patient continues to have problems with the tooth well after treatment. ...however, there is hope for you considering that you do say that it does feel better and better, so that is a major positive in your situation. hopefully you don't have to go back to see your dentist, that's the last place you should be this summer, you should be out on the golf course!!

 

sorry for the long post, if you have any questions, you can PM me as well as johnny.

 

good luck to you

[AcesAZ]

agree with johnny.

 

you shouldn't still have pain after one week if you have a "normal" filling. I say "normal" because we dentist's often-times excavate large areas of decay that comes very, very close to the nerve, then we put down a layer of base, or a calcium hydroxide layer of "protection" on top of the nerve before we put in our filling material. then we adjust your bite and send you away with a warning that the tooth may still be sensitive after a while, but it should calm down in a few days.

 

other things we need to know is if the filling you had was an amalgam(silver filling) or a composite(white filling). composite fillings can be sensitive to people for all kinds of reasons, even if the dentist did a perfect job. the reason is that a composite filling is extremely technique sensitive and you could have 20 dentist's do the same step-by-step technique, and you'll get 20 different reactions by those 20 patients. silver fillings can be sensitive too and if they are very large, they conduct temperature to the nerve of the tooth a lot more than acrylic composite fillings.

 

if it is feeling better and better, i would wait before you go back to your dentist. but if you're still feeling that the tooth is just not right, then go back to your dentist and unfortunately, you're probably looking at a root canal, and then after that a crown to encase the whole tooth to protect it and your investment in the tooth so hopefully you'll get more than 10-15 years of good service out of that tooth.

 

now, here's some terms you should know and understand so if you do go back to your dentist, you can freak him out with all your knowledge.

 

if the tooth is mildly sensitive but generally ok, we label that REVERSABLE PULPITIS. meaning that the pulp(nerve) is being irritated, it can be reversed back to normal if the irritant(hot, cold, pressure) is removed or dealt with. maybe you fall into this catagory. you had work done, the filling was irritating the nerve, but it's getting better as time goes on and the nerve isn't bothering you so much.

 

now, if you're still feeling something there after 1, 2, 3, 4 weeks, then we label that IRREVERSABLE PULPITIS where the nerve continues to cause problems and pain is still being felt. And the only way to really deal with that is to take the nerve out of the tooth(root canal), or extract the tooth.

 

personally, i totally understand your situation financially and i'm always honest with my patients, i do admit to them that it is really expensive for them to save their tooth, esp. without insurance than it is to pull it out. And honestly, if there was a gun put to my head and i had to have a tooth taken out, i would choose the upper last tooth on the top because it has the least impact on your occlusion(bite) if it was missing vs. losing any of your other teeth. if you did choose to take it out, you would lose about 10-15% of your chewing capacity on that side, so its not alot, but it is noticeable. our office charges 925.00 for a molar root canal, and 1100 for a white tooth- colored crown...so for you to save your tooth, you're looking at over 2000 dollars...we also charge 185 dollars to take your tooth out so that's a big financial decision over 1 tooth.

 

the other thing i always tell my patients:

 

look, YOU know your teeth alot more than i do. you know if it doesn't quite feel right, you know if the filling is working or it's not working...if it just doesn't quite feel right, just call us and we'll move toward making it better, be it a root canal or an extraction...if it's feeling good, then everything we did was successful and we hope you get many years of service out of that filling. btw, if the filling didn't work out and the next step is a root canal or an extraction we always apply whatever you paid for the filling towards the root canal or extraction to save you some bucks.

 

lastly, just to confuse you even more, there are two other things i need to discuss with you. one is, if the filling was left slightly high, meaning when you bite down, your bite is "off" where you hit the filling before you hit your teeth on the other side, that can be very painful to the tooth and the filling needs to be adjusted to where your bite feels just like how it did before you had the filling.

 

secondly, and this is the confusing part....you cannot always go by pain if the restoration was successful. often-times what happens is the tooth hurts, then the pain goes away not because the restoration was succcessful, but because the restoration irratated the nerve so bad that it killed the nerve completely and the nerve is completely dead, we call that a NECROTIC NERVE. a necrotic or dead nerve inside a tooth will not hurt you, but it will lead to an abcess where pus and bacteria form inside the tooth and it drains out the end of the roots, causing your face to expand the size of an orange in large abcess's. To guard against this, or check for an abcess, you must take an xray of the whole tooth to see any abcess formation which one can clearly see as a dark circle around the end of the roots in an xray. This is why we recommend seeing the dentist every 6 months for a check up and cleaning so we can catch things like this.

 

i personally think, and this is JMHO, but you are not out of the woods yet with this tooth. as long as it doesn't have a root canal and crown, you are at a slight risk to continue having "problems" and work done on this tooth at some point in the future. it's not a matter of if, but a matter of when. at least that has been my experience in cases where the filling is very, very deep and the patient continues to have problems with the tooth well after treatment. ...however, there is hope for you considering that you do say that it does feel better and better, so that is a major positive in your situation. hopefully you don't have to go back to see your dentist, that's the last place you should be this summer, you should be out on the golf course!!

 

sorry for the long post, if you have any questions, you can PM me as well as johnny.

 

good luck to you

 

Now thats an in depth reply. Yes the tooth does feel much better. Some very minor pain once in a while but overall it feels good. I figured I would have to have it pulled eventually. Thanks!

[sharkiesj]

agree with johnny.

 

you shouldn't still have pain after one week if you have a "normal" filling. I say "normal" because we dentist's often-times excavate large areas of decay that comes very, very close to the nerve, then we put down a layer of base, or a calcium hydroxide layer of "protection" on top of the nerve before we put in our filling material. then we adjust your bite and send you away with a warning that the tooth may still be sensitive after a while, but it should calm down in a few days.

 

other things we need to know is if the filling you had was an amalgam(silver filling) or a composite(white filling). composite fillings can be sensitive to people for all kinds of reasons, even if the dentist did a perfect job. the reason is that a composite filling is extremely technique sensitive and you could have 20 dentist's do the same step-by-step technique, and you'll get 20 different reactions by those 20 patients. silver fillings can be sensitive too and if they are very large, they conduct temperature to the nerve of the tooth a lot more than acrylic composite fillings.

 

if it is feeling better and better, i would wait before you go back to your dentist. but if you're still feeling that the tooth is just not right, then go back to your dentist and unfortunately, you're probably looking at a root canal, and then after that a crown to encase the whole tooth to protect it and your investment in the tooth so hopefully you'll get more than 10-15 years of good service out of that tooth.

 

now, here's some terms you should know and understand so if you do go back to your dentist, you can freak him out with all your knowledge.

 

if the tooth is mildly sensitive but generally ok, we label that REVERSABLE PULPITIS. meaning that the pulp(nerve) is being irritated, it can be reversed back to normal if the irritant(hot, cold, pressure) is removed or dealt with. maybe you fall into this catagory. you had work done, the filling was irritating the nerve, but it's getting better as time goes on and the nerve isn't bothering you so much.

 

now, if you're still feeling something there after 1, 2, 3, 4 weeks, then we label that IRREVERSABLE PULPITIS where the nerve continues to cause problems and pain is still being felt. And the only way to really deal with that is to take the nerve out of the tooth(root canal), or extract the tooth.

 

personally, i totally understand your situation financially and i'm always honest with my patients, i do admit to them that it is really expensive for them to save their tooth, esp. without insurance than it is to pull it out. And honestly, if there was a gun put to my head and i had to have a tooth taken out, i would choose the upper last tooth on the top because it has the least impact on your occlusion(bite) if it was missing vs. losing any of your other teeth. if you did choose to take it out, you would lose about 10-15% of your chewing capacity on that side, so its not alot, but it is noticeable. our office charges 925.00 for a molar root canal, and 1100 for a white tooth- colored crown...so for you to save your tooth, you're looking at over 2000 dollars...we also charge 185 dollars to take your tooth out so that's a big financial decision over 1 tooth.

 

the other thing i always tell my patients:

 

look, YOU know your teeth alot more than i do. you know if it doesn't quite feel right, you know if the filling is working or it's not working...if it just doesn't quite feel right, just call us and we'll move toward making it better, be it a root canal or an extraction...if it's feeling good, then everything we did was successful and we hope you get many years of service out of that filling. btw, if the filling didn't work out and the next step is a root canal or an extraction we always apply whatever you paid for the filling towards the root canal or extraction to save you some bucks.

 

lastly, just to confuse you even more, there are two other things i need to discuss with you. one is, if the filling was left slightly high, meaning when you bite down, your bite is "off" where you hit the filling before you hit your teeth on the other side, that can be very painful to the tooth and the filling needs to be adjusted to where your bite feels just like how it did before you had the filling.

 

secondly, and this is the confusing part....you cannot always go by pain if the restoration was successful. often-times what happens is the tooth hurts, then the pain goes away not because the restoration was succcessful, but because the restoration irratated the nerve so bad that it killed the nerve completely and the nerve is completely dead, we call that a NECROTIC NERVE. a necrotic or dead nerve inside a tooth will not hurt you, but it will lead to an abcess where pus and bacteria form inside the tooth and it drains out the end of the roots, causing your face to expand the size of an orange in large abcess's. To guard against this, or check for an abcess, you must take an xray of the whole tooth to see any abcess formation which one can clearly see as a dark circle around the end of the roots in an xray. This is why we recommend seeing the dentist every 6 months for a check up and cleaning so we can catch things like this.

 

i personally think, and this is JMHO, but you are not out of the woods yet with this tooth. as long as it doesn't have a root canal and crown, you are at a slight risk to continue having "problems" and work done on this tooth at some point in the future. it's not a matter of if, but a matter of when. at least that has been my experience in cases where the filling is very, very deep and the patient continues to have problems with the tooth well after treatment. ...however, there is hope for you considering that you do say that it does feel better and better, so that is a major positive in your situation. hopefully you don't have to go back to see your dentist, that's the last place you should be this summer, you should be out on the golf course!!

 

sorry for the long post, if you have any questions, you can PM me as well as johnny.

 

good luck to you

 

Now thats an in depth reply. Yes the tooth does feel much better. Some very minor pain once in a while but overall it feels good. I figured I would have to have it pulled eventually. Thanks!

 

 

you got it brah.....best of luck to you and your tooth.

[jackn]

Not qualified,far from it lol, but i do start the course on the 22nd!

 

Jack