so i saw my dentist today. Asked her about that x-ray which shows a shadow above the root of the tooth (between the two prongs). She said that it shows the effect of what could be infection. There was also another very thin black shadow near there which the dentist said she could not know what it was. It was like a line in a u shape. Decided today to try the least invasive procedure first so took the old filling out and it's been replaced by a temporary filling in case the old filling is the culprit. She said the tooth looked relatively ok under the filling, some yellowish colouring on the tooth but no clear sign of infection and said she is not convinced i need root canal treatment. There is no evidence of the tooth being fractured. It's now about 7 hours later and the tooth feels slightly uncomfortable when tapped. Haven't tried the hot and cold test yet. She feels the next step should this fail would be my choice of either a root canal treatment or extraction but said the root canal treatment for this particular tooth was not the easiest to do and therefore if i went for that she could refer me to a specialist clinic. It's a case of wait and see. She didn't feel that i should have any particular concern about having root treatment with the history of these facial nerve problems though. If the bone is infected (she mentioned possible low grade infection) would a root canal treatment cure that or is an extraction a better option?