Dentists/Doctors/anyone PLEASE help, I’m desperate

[UptownDowntown4]

I’ve got a really painful upper tooth and the pain radiates across my cheek as far as below my eye socket, over my jaw and in my ears.

I’ve seen my dentist and they said it’s either sinusitis or an infected root of my molar, but I’m getting symptoms of both which is making it tricker to diagnosis what it is.

It’s a dull ache most of the time across my mouth and jaw and cheek, with the possible infected molar being particularly painful, but it also goes through 10-60 minute spells of being the most excruciating pain I’ve had in my life. During these periods it’s like a pressure/stabbing/pulsing pain in my teeth area (not specific to one tooth, it’s across several teeth). My face throbs and my ear hurts and it feels like I’ve been punched or stabbed in the face. It’s not swollen but the area behind my ear aches too and hurts to touch. Under my jaw feels like a throbbing pain too. It’s only ever on the one side- the other side is fine. Then it suddenly goes as quickly as it came and goes back to the dull heavy ache. It’s only ever on one side of my face.

We were veering more towards an infected tooth root as when the dentist tapped my teeth there was one in particular that was agony, but the x ray wasn’t clear enough to diagnose it and some of my other symptoms are more consistent with sinusitis. Antibiotics and painkillers haven’t helped it.

I’m worried as during these periods of extreme pain, the stabbing pain is now in my lower teeth too (same side). It’s equally painful on the top and bottom whereas previously it was just on the top. I don’t know if it’s spread or if it’s radiating but it’s agony. I also feels like a pressure type pain, as if there’s an air bubble stuck in my jaw and cheek. Heat and ice don’t help, it just randomly stops on its own and goes back to the regular dull ache.

There’s something very wrong with either my sinus or my tooth and it’s not getting better. Im worried and in horrible pain with it and don’t know what to do. I’ve got a date set for treatment of the tooth root to see if it’s infected but it’s not until 5 months away unfortunately. Please does anyone know anything about this and what it could be? I’m not usually this hysterical but these periods of extreme pain are happening daily now and are getting more and more frequent. The dull ache/ pain is constant but just about bearable whereas the extreme pain isn’t.

Thank you in advance for any help xx

To be honest I'd ring the NHS helpline next time you feel and bad spell coming on and go wherever they send you. At the very least you'll get some decent painkillers. You can't stay like that for 5 months with no guarantee that it's even the right diagnosis!

Trigeminal Neuralgia? Although if infection suspected of either kind I don’t understand why they didn’t prescribe antibiotics.

Have you thought of trigeminal neuralgia?

Have the doctors etc tried prescribing nerve blocking drugs like gabapentin rather than just pain meds

If it was sinus pain it wouldn’t travel to the lower. Is it sore when you bend over?

Sorry just seen that they didn’t help but perhaps it wasn’t a long enough course or not the right antibiotic? Try nerve meds to see if it stops the stabbing pain, then you know it TN. Your description of it going around ear and so on makes it sound like a possibility. It’s also rather charmingly called Suicide Disease 😞

Amytriptiline or Gabapentin are for nerve pain. Is it caused by eating or touch or...?

I mean: is the stabbing pain triggered when you eat, touch area, etc? Is it like an electric shock type of pain?

Oh and i think you can choose a different hospital with a shorter wait if you’re willing to travel. Or you should have emergency surgery removal of the root. Bit if TN it might not do anything for the stabbing pain. One lady killed herself in the UK after years if dentists and pulling teeth and the pain still there and nobody suggested TN...

You need antibiotics and sometimes you need to plead with your GP to override the dentist to prescribe better and stronger antibiotics (I had to do this because I had an infection in a gap between my tooth and bone) Worst pain ever

The extreme pain you mention, together with the aching the rest of the time makes me think of Trigeminal Neuralgia too.
My Mum suffers from it and went through the whole dentist debacle too before the penny dropped.
Please see a GP and discuss medication with them to see if you can get it to calm down. A lot of doctors have never come across it, so you might have to get pushy. Fingers crossed for you x

@doodlyfiddly Oh dear I’m sorry your mum went through this, it’s not acceptable. I diagnosed myself after reading online, I get it bilateral TN which they claim can’t happen but it definitely does.

Have you seen your GP? You can't wait 5 months in this state.

@AutomaticMoon what’s bilateral TN

The sinus actually runs very close to upper back teeth - I had a recent extraction which perforated the sinus and the pain was very similar , dentist is likely to refuse to remove molar while infection is there so you need antibiotics and something for the pain

My first thought was trigeminal neuralgia. It's excruciating and comes and goes in a flash.

@Lougle I thought same p

@UptownDowntown4 what was yo ur diagnosis

Hi Op, I had exactly the same symptoms as you described, it turned out to be a cracked tooth - tooth cracks don't show up on X-rays so it took a while for my dentist to diagnose. Also, it was explained to me that you can get referred pain from teeth so in my case I was initially getting pain in top rear teeth but it later turned out the dodgy tooth was in the bottom jaw. The pain moved around all the time. My tooth was sensitive to heat and cold btw. I ended up having a root canal and crown 6 months ago and I've had no issues since (fingers crossed!). I hope you can get this sorted as it is agony. (NB I used oragel for pain on the tooth, ice packs and co-codamol. I slept on a raised pillow to reduce blood flow to the area.)

The OPs post is from Feb 22.