Socasusie,

You know I'm crying inside right now :/ Your parents probably just didn't know any better and your teeth were not a priority. That is seen very often as so many people have no idea how important dental health really is!

My heart aches for you..... I hope you are able to remedy your dental situation one day soon. Yes, it will be a huge undertaking but I just hope you can deal with it soon.

Thanks for sharing with us and for all of the support you give to this forum.

Bryanna ~'.'~

I know, please don't feel bad. My parents didn't have money, and had some of their own issues. It was everything they could do to keep us clothed and fed-dental was more a luxury. Lol. The good thing is that I'm in a better position to deal now. Don't have a second heart attack, but I have a dentist I love in Mexico- a friends family member, he actually loves in the US now, but can't practice here. He's an oral surgeon, but has another "general" dentist in his office that does the crowns and such as needed. While its still super expensive, it's at least something I can address. He's a 2 hour drive since I live in CA-but worth it.

He understands why I don't want more root canals, and why I want a plan for the teeth that have root canals. I have a 6 month plan for my current healing, and then to address my lower molars on the other side. After that, we'll do the next steps. Our first step in January was replacing several crowns with open margins-so I didn't lose those teeth yet.

Just to entertain you, I attached my first X-ray from before him and I started in January....needless to say there are some more implants now....

ps-do you like that my US oral surgeon left the root in the molar on the left side?

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Socasusie,

Thanks for posting the panorex. NO it's not entertaining :/ It is basically what I expected. You poor thing :/ When my sister and I were kids my parents couldn't afford much either but we had dental care regularly. My mother made endless monthly payments to the dentist for as long as I could remember.

You are doing the best that you can. If you are comfortable with your dentist and he knows your current view on things, that's a good reason to stay with him!

Why did the oral surgeon leave those roots in your jaw? That's crazy!

Bryanna

Bryanna:
I just started reading the endo book, it's written by an endodontist from Norway. I started reading in the middle (as I am interested in what they say about nature of pain for certain dental conditions), but it does describe the anatomy first and it also describes the procedures, yup. You can preview it on Google Books, that's how I found it (was searching for retrograde pulpitis). Why? Because my dentist simply said this pain is because of periodontal pocket, wrote "periodontitis" as diagnosis and referred me to the specialist. I've done some research and periodontitis is often described as painless, while my pain is 7/10 and very similar to pulpal inflammation.

Focal infections: While I always do research, analysis and form my own opinion about such stuff and don't to accept black&white views, these focal infection issues clearly say something is very fishy - for example, before you have heart surgery, the first thing they do is a panoramic x-ray to check for focal infections, and then they ** extract ** the problematic teeth. So when the stakes are high, teeth get extracted promptly, which says volumes.

socasusie:
Is that a scan of the x-ray or is it the original digital version you got? It's kind of blurry?

Peter

The oral surgeon, nor my general dentist ever acknowledged they were even there. It was when I started going to this we guy that he pointed them out, and that it was a bad situation begging for an infection. We're addressing that in January.

My parents didn't even have us brush, we had lots of juice/soda, etc. My parents almost thought there was nothing they could do. My mom had full dentures by 50, and my father was losing all his teeth by 60 due to periodontal disease, but he smoked quite heavily and didn't care for his teeth at all.

I love this dentist-he's been more the most thorough of all my dentists. Most dentists are reactive, while he's willing to be proactive.

Peter, I'm not sure-it was just for my insurance company, and they emailed it to me. He's done different types of xrays before actual procedures.

Peter,

I am glad that you do your research and think things through before making decisions. So as you already know it is best to be as informed as possible so you can make those decisions. I'm right there with ya!!

Many times a patient will be diagnosed with periodontitis when it concerns a root canaled tooth... why??.... because they don't want to admit that the rc tooth is not healthy because they know that is not what the patient wants to hear. They will go to great lengths to retain an unhealthy tooth only to have it removed anyway. This condition can be painful and it is most likely due to the inflammation process.

It is not unusual for a root canaled tooth to end up with periodontitis because the bacteria has overwhelmed the tissue lining the pocket which is pushing the bone away from the tooth. Did the dentist stick a paper point in to the pocket to confirm periodontitis in that area?

<<<for example, before you have heart surgery, the first thing they do is a panoramic x-ray to check for focal infections, and then they ** extract ** the problematic teeth. So when the stakes are high, teeth get extracted promptly, which says volumes.>>>

THANK YOU FOR POSTING THIS STATEMENT!!!! THE CARDIOLOGISTS, ONCOLOGISTS AND ORTHOPEDISTS THAT TELL THEIR PATIENTS TO GET A DENTAL CLEARANCE SHOULD BE COMMENDED!!
HOWEVER........ BELIEVE IT OR NOT... NOT ALL CARDIOLOGISTS TELL THEIR PATIENTS TO GET A DENTAL CLEARANCE PRIOR TO HEART SURGERY. YOU CAN IMAGINE THE DISTRAUGHT THIS CAUSES ME WHEN I SEE A PATIENT AFTER THE FACT!!
IF THAT WASN'T BAD ENOUGH..... ON TOP OF THAT... SOME DENTISTS WILL NOT DIAGNOSE RC TEETH AS BEING INFECTED EVEN IF THERE ARE RADIO-GRAPHIC FINDINGS UNLESS THE PATIENT COMPLAINS ABOUT PAIN. WHY? THEY DON'T WANT TO CAUSE THE PATIENT ADDITIONAL STRESS BY TELLING THEM TO HAVE THESE INFECTED TEETH REMOVED. SO THE DENTIST SIGNS OFF ON THE PATIENT, THE SURGEON AND PATIENT ASSUMES IT'S A GO AHEAD FOR SURGERY AND LOW AND BEHOLD... THE PATIENT HAS POST OP COMPLICATIONS DUE TO WHAT????... INFECTION.

All of that has been an ongoing battle I've been fighting for many, many years. I cannot tell you how often I get a physician on the phone who I swear got their degree at wonderland!!! I cannot stress enough that people need to be their own health advocate. We just cannot rely on doctors or dentists to take proper care of us if we approach things with a blind eye. We need to get involved and become better informed and not hesitate to ask questions. Believe me, if we don't it just comes back to haunt us sooner than later.

Bryanna

socasusie,
How have you made out with your dental implants? Especially reguarding your Lupus? Also, did you have titanium or zirconium implants placed? I need to figure out what I'm going to do about tooth # 14's replacement soon. I have left it completely alone for 4 1/2 months now because the extraction of the root canaled tooth has caused some auto immune like flare ups and now I'm scared to do the implant as to further comprimise my health...I would appreciate your thoughts..Thanks

Short update. Yesterday there was zero pain, but it's back today. However, today I can pinpoint it to the gum between #14 and #15, hurts like hell. I've seen my dentist #2 (private one) today (had a scheduled appointment) and presented the situation to him. He says the x-ray is inconslusive, the dark area could be an infection, but can't say for sure (as Bryanna said, it's impossible to see in a 2D x-ray). He says I would need a 3D CT to be sure. He also took a picture at the area between #14 and #15 and measured the gum and says this may be gingivitis, but certainly not periodontitis, as the gum looks ok. There may be a cavity in mesial side of #15 (not sure on the x-ray but it looks so visually and with intraoral camera). The plan now is to do deep cleaning of gums in that area and to check out that cavity (next week). If the pain persists, I will visit dentist #1 (public one) again to get an urgent referral to endodontist or oral surgeon, but he is a bit uninterested (even said that cavity is not accessible and that he can only do a root canal on #15... dentist #2 said that cavity is not even complicated to access).

I checked out the 3D CT and it's not so expensive (40-70 Euros), so I might do that too, preemptively.

I have 2 healing, so I don't know on those yet, but my other 3 are doing great so far. I have titanium. Neither of the oral surgeons I worked with do zirconium, they don't feel they're strong enough and if they break they felt it was a harder replacement. A,so, I have titanium screws in my knee already, so we know I'm compatible. In fact the orthopedic surgeon who did my knee said most people gave to have them replaced at 20 years, but mine are so solid he doubts I'll ever have them replaced.

Do you have an autoimmune disease already? Or was this new? In my case my oral surgeon and rheumatologist worked together. I've also only been on prednisone for short periods. My oral surgeon has experience on doing them on people with lupus, and hasn't had issues. The challenging thing in my case is he couldn't prescribe the anti-inflammatory he wanted to because my doctors said no. Also, I heal slower in the sense that I'm in pain longer.

I'm happy to answer any questions you have, but I love my implants overall.

socasusie,

Thanks for responding...I suffer from levaquin toxicity. I was given two bags of IV levaquin in the ER 5 1/2 years ago for what turnrd out to be NOT an infection afterall!!! The levaquin toxicity has left me with many, many, health issues that mimic autoimmine issues, however, nothing ever shows up in people who have been poisoned.....but the issues are very real and they control our lives! That being said, I now react to everything and my body can't deal with what it used to. The extraction on #14 on March 4, 2013 triggered alot of symptoms that had been gone for a while, so now I'm scared as what to do.

I also had some sort of reaction the dental anesthesia the day of the extraction. Tooth #13 is a healthy, never been touched tooth, but #15 has a huge amalgam in it that needs to be replaced, so using that for a dental bridge would be fine..it's just that I dont want have to touch #13. And..although #14 was a root canaled tooth, it appears that #15 was the culprit reguarding my pain all along, as I still have the exact same pain that I had when I thought it was coming from #14. Now that 14 is gone, I now know where the pain is coming from...ugh, so you can see my dilema