Dental Emergency

Preventing a Painful Dental Emergency That Requires Root Canal

A dental emergency is no fun. The pain it can give can be more than any other type. The pain can arise quite suddenly and it might seem uncontrollable.

Good news is that there are treatments available for dental emergencies. You can get the pain and its root cause eliminated. However, you need to see if you have not been giving much attention to preventive dental care.

Dental emergencies that require root canal treatment

You may be able to avoid dental emergencies if you are visiting the dentist regularly because they will catch the problem before it starts making things painful. Nevertheless, not visiting the dentist regularly can lead you to have bacterial buildup in several areas of your oral cavity. This bacterial buildup can lead to several infections in the teeth, gums and other parts of the mouth. The end result could be quite alarming and painful.

There are a few symptoms which may indicate that you require a root canal treatment. However, not all symptoms always indicate the need of a root canal. Those symptoms are:

• Persisting pain after the hot or cold item is removed from the teeth
• Painful chewing and biting
• Pulsing pain
• Pain radiating to other areas such as neck and face
• Tooth getting darkened
• Persistent bump on the gums
• Hypersensitivity

If these conditions do not go away, you need to visit the dentist. You may require a root canal here.

What is a root canal?

The root canal treatment sounds like a scary word but it not scary at all. The reason people fear root canal treatment is its history. It had been quite painful in the past but not anymore thanks to the modern dentistry. This process involves drilling of a hole on the chewing surface of the infected tooth. This hole passes through the dentin to the inner chamber which contains tooth pulp. The infected pulp, which hurts, is removed through the hole. The chamber is cleaned and filled with medicated filler. In the end, the tooth is sealed at the side of the hole with the help of dental filling. If the process requires removal of tooth’s strong structure, the tooth becomes quite vulnerable after the treatment. In this scenario, a dental crown is then used to secure the tooth.

Avoiding the need of root canal

While root canals are least painful in this era, it is still advised to take care of your teeth in order to avoid the need of root canal treatment. The drilling of hole and removal of infected pulp brings death to the infected tooth. Here, you will have to keep in mind the way inner part of the tooth gets infected. When tooth decay converts into a cavity, the inner layers of the tooth are exposed to infectious germs. These infectious germs result in the need of root canal treatment.

In order to avoid infections, you will have to stay on the top of your oral hygiene. Make sure that you brush and floss your teeth on daily basis. Moreover, you need to visit your dentist twice in every year.