What are my choices for an abscessed tooth?

| December 23, 2013

Young woman is having toothache

Our patient story of the week is about a patient that came to our Columbus dental office  because they had been having some pain in a back lower tooth.  The pain wasn’t constant but when flared up it was very painful.   After completing a dental exam I told the patient that the tooth was abscessed

When you are deciding on how to treat a problem tooth, there are three options:

Remove it
Save it
Delay treatment

Removing a tooth

Sometimes you may not have an alternative, and your tooth may have to be removed. It’s important to replace a tooth after it’s been extracted.

A missing tooth can set off a chain reaction resulting in new problems.
When a tooth is lost, the biting force changes on the teeth next to the space and they begin to shift.
When a tooth no longer has anything to bite against, it can begin to extrude out of it’s socket.
As your bite changes, your jaw joint may be damaged.
It is much harder to clean teeth that have shifted.
Harmful plaque and tarter can accumulate, causing cavities and periodontal disease.
If you need to remove a tooth, replacing the tooth with a dental implant my be a good solution to avoid these problems.

Saving a tooth

If a tooth is healthy enough to be saved, the alternatives to having it removed may be having root canal therapy and a crown, or using surgical procedures such as bone grafting or root amputation.

Delaying dental treatment

Delaying dental treatment is a risky alternative because the problem will only get worse.  Without dental treatment the problem will not improve.

If the tooth has a cavity, it will get deeper and get into the nerve.

If there is bone loss around the tooth, you will lose more bone.
If the damage has gone too far, and the tooth has to be removed, then delaying treatment lets the infection spread to other teeth or even to the rest of your body.

If it’s been a while since you have been to a dentist, make an appointment with our Columbus dentist office today.  Call us at 614-486-7378.

Similar Blog Posts for more information on this topic.

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