Re: Recent bad dental experience

Moshula wrote:
On Jul 22, 8:47 am, Steven Bornfeld <dentaltwinm...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

While there's no excuse for not recognizing a retained root tip, small
fragments of this size are not usually responsible for pain. It is also
likely that some of the hard fragments were pieces of bone, not tooth.
Of course, having the second procedure extends healing time.
It is likely you suffered from a dry socket, which is no fun (esp. if
this was a lower molar), and this was responsible for the pain.

Thanks much for your feedback.

In respect to your statement, "small fragments of this size are not
usually responsible for pain":
to reiterate, the root tip was over 1 centimeter in length. I'd hardly
characterize it as a "small fragment" in light of the fact that the
entire tooth, when intact, couldn't have been much more than a few cm
in length.

Also, lo and behold, within a few short days of the root tip's
removal I'm completely off painkillers, whereas up until the day of
the removal I'd been taking heavy doses of such.

I read with special interest your (very perceptive, in my view!)
statement,

"It is also likely that some of the hard fragments were pieces of
bone, not tooth."

In fact, the oral surgeon pointed out an area of concern he had
where it appeared that bone in front of the extracted tooth was
missing (I'd also been having pain in what I'd thought was the tooth
in front of the one that had been root canaled/extracted.)

You also wrote, "It is likely you suffered from a dry socket".
However, the extracting dentist (the one who'd left the root tip in
the socket) specifically denied, when I asked him during my first post-
extraction follow-up visit, the possibility of there being a dry
socket situation. As mentioned in my original post, he checked the
site of the extraction and said it looked great and there specifically
was not dry socket.



Sorry--I'd misread 1 and 1/10 cm as 1/10. Of course I can't discount that there was residual infection, nor that this could have been partly or mostly responsible for your pain.
Sometimes losing some of the alveolar bone is unavoidable, but if the adjacent tooth is leaned upon too heavily during the extraction it may indeed make it tender to biting pressure. Usually if the tooth isn't moved too severely it will recover however.

Steve
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Is this Dry Socket?
    ... The patient has stated there's no pain. ... If pain resumes or the patient notices loose bone ... of it touched the hole. ... Sometime bone fragments will come out, ...
    (sci.med.dentistry)
  • Re: Recent bad dental experience
    ... likely that some of the hard fragments were pieces of bone, not tooth. ... It is likely you suffered from a dry socket, ... and this was responsible for the pain. ...
    (sci.med.dentistry)
  • Re: Is this Dry Socket?
    ... If pain resumes or the patient notices loose bone fragments he should return to his surgeon for treatment, which should be no big deal. ... of it touched the hole. ...
    (sci.med.dentistry)
  • Re: Is this Dry Socket?
    ... The patient has stated there's no pain. ... If pain resumes or the patient notices loose bone ... of it touched the hole. ... She looked at the hole from the tooth I had out, ...
    (sci.med.dentistry)
  • Re: How long before chew on root canal?
    ... The pain is due to inflammation *under* the tooth--between the tooth and the bone. ...
    (sci.med.dentistry)