Years ago, this is how the story went: You wake up to an excruciating pain in your mouth. After fishing around with your fingers, you manage to pinpoint the location of pain to one of your incisors. You press down on it and lightning bolts of pain shoot from the tip of your tooth to the very bottom of your feet – sending a shock through your body that you wouldn’t expect from such a small piece of anatomy.
So, you head to the local dentist. And after some painful poking and prodding, he numbs the area as best as he can, looks at you with his large spotlight and fires up his dental drill with an intimidating whirr. Unfortunately, since its 1901 – Your day isn’t going to get a whole lot better.
But wait a minute. Fortunately for you, it’s 2016 and dental technology has come quite a long way. It’s come so far in fact, that the scary visions of “root canal treatment” from bygone days are just that – scary visions, and they actually couldn’t be much further from the truth. But now that we’ve looked to the past in terms of root canal treatment. Let’s look to the future.
So, you’ve just had root canal treatment. Surprisingly, it wasn’t much worse than getting a cavity filled. While you might be praising modern anesthesia and the high-tech craftsmanship behind today’s modern dental drill, pretty soon that anesthesia will wear off – and you’re probably wondering, “what’s next?”
While you might experience a small amount of discomfort, it should be entirely bearable. After your tooth has fully healed, it’s not uncommon for a successful root canal treatment to render the tooth perfectly capable of years upon years of useful service. In fact, once your tooth’s been treated with root canal therapy, there’s a good chance (if you take care of it) that it will last just as long as your other natural teeth.
All you need to do is…
Take care of it! After your tooth’s been restored by your dentist, all you need to do is make sure you practice good oral hygiene. With daily brushing, flossing, and rinsing combined with regular cleanings and checkups, you can ensure that your restored tooth blends perfectly with your other natural teeth.
From time to time, your dentist might recommend getting an x-ray here or there. This is in order to ensure that the tooth is healing properly from the inside. On rare occasions, a tooth that’s been treated can become re-infected. You’ll know this has happened if the tooth seems painful or irritable again. Fortunately, if this happens your dentist can usually get back inside to clean out the infection and repair your tooth once again.
Looking for more helpful information about your teeth? The dentists at Cypress DDS are experienced root canal dentists in Cypress, CA with a wide variety of additional specialties, making them an incredible dental resource for families of every kind
- Tags: Root Canal, Root Canal Treatment
