Will I Need an Extraction after Bonding?

I had to stop seeing my dentist for a while because of a period when he wasn’t accepting my dental insurance. At a regular checkup with a new dentist, he found a cavity and offered to fill it right then and there. He used a bonding material. It started hurting shortly thereafter and the pain increased. I went in three times over the next couple of weeks for adjustments but it never did any good so I gave up. At some point, my dentist started taking my insurance again so I had him look at the bonded filling. He was able to get me out of pain then my flosser kept getting caught on it and I was worried that food and bacteria would get in there. He suggested we redo the filling. I agreed, but after the appointment was over and the numbness wore off, the tooth instantly started hurting pretty bad and I had a low fever. Then my tooth developed sensitivity to hot and cold. He suggested I take ibuprofen. When that didn’t work, he gave me steroids and told me if that doesn’t work I will need the tooth extracted. I don’t want to lose this tooth and it is still hurting. Is there any hope for it?

Casey

Dear Casey,

Man grabbing his jaw in pain

The fact that you have had two dentists in this network that do not seem to know what they are doing is very illuminating to me. Let’s start with the first dentist. He should have been able to adjust the dental bonding for your filling in order to get you out of pain. It is not that hard. Then, the second dentist got you out of pain but created an additional defect. Neither of these things should have happened.

Compound that with your second dentist prescribing steroids when you were fighting an infection and that concerns me. Steroids dampen your immune system, making it harder to fight off an infection. It sounds like you are in a super cheap dental plan that attracts low skilled dentists who need a low cost network to keep patients.

I think you are going to have to go out of network to find a competent dentist to deal with this properly. This is one example of when a cheap dentist ends up not being an affordable dentist because of the damage they did.

This blog is brought to you by Baton Rouge Dentist Dr. Steven Collins.