Root Canal Therapy
I am going to be very daring this month and speak of a forbidden word. For many of you from ages 30 to 80, please do not end your reading in horror as I mention the word ROOT CANAL THERAPY. The connotations and jokes regarding this dental procedure are widely know. Regularly, I hear someone in the media say the magic phrase, I'd rather have a root canal than...?.

Amazingly enough...and this is the truth...modern root canal therapy is usually so comfortable that it is the number one procedure in our office that people fall asleep during! I always say to patients, that nine out of ten times, root canal therapy is very comfortable but when a severe infection in the tooth prevents our ability to make the initial therapy comfortable, that person is the one who tells 100 friends and the other nine remain silent.

As many of you know, root canal therapy is necessary to save teeth when the nerve of the tooth is damaged usually by a large cavity or large filling that has been in for a long time and one more trauma to the tooth, i.e.: another filling or a leak in the old filling causes the nerve to just plain give up. Sometimes nerves give up and die quietly and you might never know it has died, but sometimes it can be one of the most severe pains known to man. The worst is called a necrosing pulpitis and you might know someone who could only keep the severe pain away by keeping ice on the tooth. If you are initially lucky and the nerve died quietly, then the now dead nerve material is a great feeding ground for bacteria to travel throughout your blood stream. After eating the dead nerve debris, the bacteria grow and form and abscess, in the bone around the tooth - then you may have a swollen face or pressure feeling and bite sensitivity.

All of these dying or dead nerve conditions require the nerve to be removed from the tooth or losing the tooth. We now try to save all teeth and as we know our ability to chew in our later years greatly effects the quality of life we will have. It is estimated that people with their teeth live an average of seven years longer than those without. Our modern ways to numb the tooth usually allow the procedure to be very comfortable but it is one of the most boring a patient undergoes as we very exactingly clean out the small channels and let the person sit with sterilizing solution in those channels.

Some music in your ears in a reclined, relaxed position with your eyes shut after a busy morning or afternoon at work allows many to simply take a nap. So if you have many older fillings the opportunity of this treatment will probably come to you. PLEASE allow yourself the opportunity for a lifetime smile and think of your time with us as an opportunity to relax in a day.