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

welshdent

In my experience discomfort associated with thermal stimulation i.e. hot and cold is usually associated with a nerve that is inflammed/exposed. That wont be the case with a root filled tooth as there would be no nerve so its possible that another tooth is causing the problem. You would more likely in my experience be getting a shooting pain when you bite together and put pressure on the tooth if a crack was the problem. My advise though is to go back to your dentist and have it properly assessed.

Happy_shopper

If it's not likely to be the root-filled tooth that's causing pain, then I'm stumped. Is it possible there's some nerve remaining? Oh well, I'll ask my dentist to check it out. Could it be possible it's just a sensitive tooth causing the pain and sensitive toothpaste may fix it? I'm not aware of any other problems in that area of my mouth (although I'll still ask my dentist to have a look). Thanks for the speedy reply.

missPinky

Hi

I have been told that sometimes the root canal can become infected and cause pain similar to when before you had it done. Or a bit of the nerve might still be alive and woken up with the prodding done by the dentist

chef74

hi, i started having pain in my tooth last night, so i went to a emergency dentist today, who told me that a filling i had was infected, so he said i need root canal treatment, he took the old filling out, and started the treatment, and put a temp filling in, he then said i need to go back to my reg dentist this week, but im still in a lot of pain, is this normall??

jugglebug

chef74 wrote: »

hi, i started having pain in my tooth last night, so i went to a emergency dentist today, who told me that a filling i had was infected, so he said i need root canal treatment, he took the old filling out, and started the treatment, and put a temp filling in, he then said i need to go back to my reg dentist this week, but im still in a lot of pain, is this normall??

Yes
Sometimes you get immediate pain relief but not always (depends on a lot of things)
A day or 2 should see things ease.

chef74

jugglebug wrote: »

Yes
Sometimes you get immediate pain relief but not always (depends on a lot of things)
A day or 2 should see things ease.

thanks.....:j:j:j

capomeister

chef74 wrote: »

thanks.....:j:j:j

Just to reassure you further - I had an infection in my root a few weeks ago too, and once the abscess had been drained the pain subsided in 2 days - first day was still pretty bad. Ibuprofen/Nurofen helped me get through those initial days.

For the root filling make sure you are put on antibiotics before and for at least 5 days after if you have any metal plates in you, as there have been cases of infection of the plated areas. My consultant told me this is an important precaution! Then again the emergency dentist probably prescribed you antiobotics if you had an infection?

brook2jack

There are no dentists who will give you antibiotics to stop infection in metal plates because you are at more risk from an allergic reaction to the antibiotics than from an infection arising from root treatment.

By far the biggest risk of causing a bacteraemia ( bugs from the mouth going into the blood and causing infection ) is having bad gum problems and simply eating!! Any infection in the mouth and particularly gum disease causes a rise in blood bugs every time you chew which is why it is so important to brush and floss for your general health.Root treatment does not cause a rise in blood bugs.

The official advice to dentists for many years now is NOT to give antibiotics for this reason and your consultant is wrong.Oral bugs have been implicated in hip replacement infections etc but this is due to the bacteraemias (increase in bacteria in blood) caused by poor oral hygiene, which are coincidentally also thought to be a factor in heart disease and many other illnesses.

capomeister

brook2jack wrote: »

There are no dentists who will give you antibiotics to stop infection in metal plates because you are at more risk from an allergic reaction to the antibiotics than from an infection arising from root treatment.

By far the biggest risk of causing a bacteraemia ( bugs from the mouth going into the blood and causing infection ) is having bad gum problems and simply eating!! Any infection in the mouth and particularly gum disease causes a rise in blood bugs every time you chew which is why it is so important to brush and floss for your general health.Root treatment does not cause a rise in blood bugs.

The official advice to dentists for many years now is NOT to give antibiotics for this reason and your consultant is wrong.Oral bugs have been implicated in hip replacement infections etc but this is due to the bacteraemias (increase in bacteria in blood) caused by poor oral hygiene, which are coincidentally also thought to be a factor in heart disease and many other illnesses.

Thanks for this information Brook2Jack - pretty much confirmed by the secretary at my dentist when I called this afternoon. She said government advice changed 2 years ago and dentists now no longer administer antibiotics before treatment as the patient has a far greater chance of suffering an allergic reaction to the antibiotic than contracting a blood infection from the treatment. I guess my consultant, not being a dentist, wasn't aware of the latest research and guidance regarding antibiotics and dental work.

palegirl1

Just to let you know the end of the tale - I had to take my details down personally with another x-ray to Eastmans as they said they hadn't received my dentists forms and was seen for consultation a few weeks later and was then deemed to be in so much pain that I was offered treatment within 3 weeks. I was told that this was a record as normally people can wait for up to a year to get seen. After a good few appointments had my last treatment yesterday - 2 root canals top and bottom and unfortunately - I think possibly because of having to wait 2 weeks to have the amalgam restoration of the bottom molar taken down and adjusted - the top 2nd molar had cracked across and they told me it would now have to be extracted.

I am upset after all the pain and work that this has happened but I'm now more frightened and unsure of what to do. I don't really have much faith in the NHS dentist and think they are just going to refer me back to the hospital. I'm still suffering iron deficiency and worried that if not extracted correctly and in good time that I may lose more bone. However I do recognise that it could have cost me a great deal of money to have the procedure done by a private endodontist especially since one tooth went so wrong at the end.