root canal treatment - NHS and private costs & pros and cons

lolababy

Hi if it affecting your health Id consider having it removed.

labyrinth_2

Just to add, that I've just tried touching to gum high up, so not the tooth, just the gum high up in my mouth above that tooth and I can feel it sore in the tooth.


I have considered having it removed but don't want to do that if there's still a good chance it'll settle on it's own. I'm very mindful that if it comes out I can't go back. I feel stuck in a horrible situation though. I can dig in and keep going if I knew it was going to be alright, trouble is I have no idea if it is or not

Toothsmith

High up in the gum is where the roots end, and so that's where the infection/inflammation from the tooth will be.

vigman

Toothsmith wrote: »

They can take a long time to settle sometimes, but sometimes they don't settle, and you'll need it out.

About three months ago I had a root canal. A week later it was very painful and the dentist found and removed (very painfully) some remaining live nerve.

All seemed well, but my tooth still hurts to tap it (but not chew on it). At a checkup yesterday he said 1.) that there could still be a tiny amount of residual tissue but to leave things unless pain/infection builds up 2.) as he had spent time in the two attempts (on Denplan), if it flared up again he would extract it unless I paid privately.

Surely he should have got it right the first time, or continued until successful?

Can you run out of Denplan allowed treatment (to be fair he charges us low premiums)?

What if I presented to another dentist for treatment to this tooth and tell them I am on Denplan.....will this affect what my own dentist gets paid for any future treatment on me?

Any clarity on these issues welcomed

TIA

Vigman

Toothsmith

Denplan is an agreement between you and your dentist. The money you pay doesn't follow you to another dentist like a pot. You would have to pay a different dentist unless you stopped your agreement with dentist 1 and started a fresh one with dentist 2.

There are many reasons why a root filling might not work. It would seem like the dentist has given it a good go. If he feels a third attempt might work, then your Denplan will cover this, if he doesn't then it needs to come out.

What your Denplan wouldn't cover would be if the dentist thinks that although he couldn't save it, a specialist might be able to.If you were referred to the specialist, you'd have to pay for that.

This is no cop-out from your dentist though. He's tried. Specialists are specialists because theyve concentrated on that one aspect and have become very very good at it. Like you wouldn't expect your GP doctor to do a heart transplant for you if you needed one!

In dentistry it is complicated more by you paying for some things, and having other things covered - but as I said earlier, it sounds to me like your GP dentist has tried his best, and now the decision has to be what to do next.

vigman

Thanks for the explanations, Toothsmith. He was obviously cross that the two 'Denplan' attempts had failed and said that private work for this could cost up to 1000gbp so would take it out next time!

I understand that this must be a technically challenging operation, BUT if my car wasn't fixed first or second time, I wouldn't expect to pay for the third attempt. (I also operate a 'no fix, no fee' policy when I do private IT work)

However, can a slightly painful residual nerve problem after root canal work settle down in the end or is it always bound to end in full on infection at some time?

Thanks again

Vigman

Avant960

Thank you Fork86.

I have cancelled my RCT appointment with my second Dentist and I have made an appointment to see my first Dentist. Unfortunately, I can’t get an appointment until 3rd November so I will have to wait until then to speak to him.

It seemed that everything was fine on the right side of my mouth until he started work. However, as I have said he may have found a underlying problem when he did the x-ray.

Fork86 wrote: »

Which then begs the question, did the x-rays your original dentist take indicate any decay within the pulp chamber/nerve of the teeth on the right, and if they did, why he didn't either notice it, or not commence the appropriate treatment? And why did he not notice anything to suggest the root filling on the left tooth had also failed?

I have also wondered why he did not say anything about decay on the right or that the root filling on left needed redoing. I am assuming that in the space of four weeks the need for a RCT would not occur so I am perplexed as to why he did not see all of what the second Dentist discovered.

Thank you for your advice. I hope that I can get this all sorted out.

coldstreamalways

It may take some time to settle so don't be hasty, if the supporting structures of the tooth were infected (I didn't read why your Root Canal was done), they don't heal quickly like skin for example.

I understand you saying no fix, no fee but this analogy doesn't really transfer to a procedure like Root Canal. My patients don't pay for their treatment and nor am I responsible for the cost of the instruments but just a cartridge of local anaesthetic can cost as much as 76p. Add all of the other "single use" instruments and the bill is quite high even if the dentist just did the procedure at cost (ie £50 for drills and files + nurse pay and insurance and mortgage on practice etc).
This is something that doesn't usually apply to other jobs. I'm probably not explaining this too well so I'll let toothsmith take the reins!

elsien

Labyrinth, my root canal is still settling in and I had it done in April. The twinges come and go, sometimes it's fine, other times it's more severe. I went back to the dentist and got some antibiotics as the xray showed a bit of infection, which helped. However I was told that as the tooth that was done had quite a large cavity in to start with, there may be a very small crack in the tooth which hasn't shown up on the xray, which could mean that bacteria might keep getting in. In which case, there's nothing more that can be done and eventually I'll lose the tooth.
So I'm playing wait and see. Hoping that it'll settle, taking paracetamol if it hurts too much and keeping fingers toes and everything else crossed that it stays around long enough for me to get my moneys worth.

vigman

coldstreamalways wrote: »

It may take some time to settle so don't be hasty, if the supporting structures of the tooth were infected (I didn't read why your Root Canal was done), they don't heal quickly like skin for example.
QUOTE]

Thanks for that. One problem is that I have had two root canals in teeth next to each other and as the pain is sort of between them I'm not sure if one or both are now dodgy!! I can't be 'hasty' as I don't want the wrong one taken out!

Both teeth just started hurting but without any cavities or breaks, and I was told that the nerve/pulp can just start getting sensitive for no particular reason?

I understand your comment on fixed costs and I'd pay 100ish for a third attempt but not 800-1000!

TIA

Vigman