To wonder what the hell I do about my tooth?

[MyFaceHurts]

I had toothache back in June, horrible, deep nerve pain. Went to the dentist, saw a guy I hadn’t seen before. He x rayed the tooth and said I needed root canal. He made a start that day (1.5 hours), as this was on a Friday and he didn’t want to leave me in pain over the weekend. It was fucking agony while he removed as much as he could of the nerve. He then put a temporary filling in and made another appointment for me on the Monday. All good over the weekend, pain had gone.

Went back on Monday thinking it wouldn’t be so bad as I believed the nerve was now gone. I was wrong, it was another 1.5 hours just as bad as before. Finally after a lot of drilling he’d managed to fill the canals and took an x ray to make sure everything was ok.

It wasn’t ok. Somehow he’d managed to put the filling (long two pronged thing that was supposed to go into the canals) INTO MY GUM. I couldn’t quite believe it. He was very flustered and kept apologising and said that he’d have to remove it, and I’d have to come back another time. Basically I was back to where I started before that appointment except now presumably with added damage to my gums.

Unfortunately I was going away the next day for a couple of weeks. I got home from the dentist and had a think and then phoned and explained what happened, and asked if it was possible to see the other dentist next time, as after 3 hours of agony culminating in having a filling put in my gum, I was a bit scared. They said I could but he’s very booked up and I can’t go until the 29th july.

Problem is the temporary filling has come out this weekend and now I’m in a lot of pain. I know I can hopefully get an emergency appointment on Monday but that’s far away when you’re in this much pain.

I know there is definitely still some nerve left In one of the tooth canals, which is why the pain is so bad. I’m taking painkillers, but I’m still in pain and my tooth is pulsating the whole time.

How the hell am I going to get through to Monday? Bearing in mind it’s nerve rather than cavity pain. Any tips or suggestions?

Oil of cloves helps, Boots sell it or get it online. It numbs. It saved my sanity in the past (also root canal woes).

Would Anbesol liquid help? That is a local anaesthetic (buy at any pharmacy) but I guess it depends if you can get it close enough to the nerve to help
Good luck, you really do have my sympathy having had nerve pain for 2 days over New Year a few years back

What pain killers are you taking? When I have dental pain, I take nurofen plus/rapid relief. They work brlliantly and are recomended by my dentist. I had horrific pain one night and had to resort to holding a cold can of fiz on my face all night. It was a bit awkward, but it worked in easing the pain and I actually managed to get some sleep.

Hope you manage to get some relief before Momday.

Weed. Seriously.

Oil of cloves or Orajel from Boots will help.
Also there is a temporary filling pack called "Temparin" i think. It comes in a tiny purple pot. It might help you cover the area and relieve some pain until Monday.
Good luck, hope you get it sorted quickly/

Try swilling cool water around your tooth. I had to do that when I’m pain as it is the only way the pain went. I had a jug of water and a big pan to spit the water into when the water got warm.

Take Ibuprofen as well. Does anyone you know have any Co-Codamol. A couple of those might help you sleep.
Are you up here in the North West? x

Thank you for the suggestions. I did use clove oil for toothache when I was a teenager and I remember it tasting bloody horrible and not doing much to help. But at this point may be worth a shot.

I’ve never used ambesol before but have heard good things about it. Not sure if it’s for cavity pain or whether it would help for a root problem though?

Temporary filling kit sounds good, I think if I could stop anything getting in it that could help and I might be able to eat again.

Funnily enough I was swilling cold water around my tooth without even realising I was doing it when I read that comment. I think it helped a bit, I’ve just cleaned my teeth, very gently on the painful side, had to turn the electric toothbrush off though as it’s so sensitive.

I'd also consider just getting the tooth out. I had a rotten year last year with a similar tooth that just kept getting infected. Got it out and the relief was amazing.

Painkillers wise I’m on 30mg codeine/500mg paracetamol co-codamol as I have it on prescription for my back. Might have to just keep necking them until I see the dentist, even though they make me want to sleep so won’t be great for getting on with stuff. I tried nurofen before my original trip to the dentists and it didn’t even touch the sides of the pain.

It’s a top canine tooth so if I can save it I’d like to, as there will be an obvious gap there if not. If it was a back one I’d have had the bugger out straight away on the first trip 🤣

I'm unsure about the train of events here.

Four hours of dental surgery that resulted in a root-filling in your gum? That's come out?

Any competent dental surgeon would have removed the tooth some time before that outcome.

A two-pronged thing? That went in the wrong place?

@MyFaceHurts something has happened, I don't think it's exactly as you've said though.

@TreeOfPain no sadly it’s exactly as I said. The dentist thought he was putting the filling in my tooth canals but completely fucked up and what he’d actually done was drill into my gum and put it in there. I will attach the X-ray, I took a pic on my phone. So then he immediately removed it, and put a temporary filling in (again) and kept apologising and said ‘it was like this appointment didn’t happen’ in terms of my progress. He’d spent 1.5 hours doing what he believed was cleaning out the canals but he had been drilling into my gum all along.

Both trips were honestly so painful and now I’m terrified to go back, and I have never been nervous about dentists before and always been pretty gung-ho about any treatment.

To be clearer, the red lines are either side of the dark line through the middle of my tooth which is the canal the filling should have gone into. The purple circle is around the filling in my gum where it ended up.

As a recent long term sufferer of severe dental pain, I would recommend Orajel (extra strength) from behind the counter on the tooth, Anbesol on the gum around the tooth and get Oraldene mouth wash which numbs the mouth. Bit miserable for eating as you can't taste your food for a bit but it's better than pain. Hoping you get everything sorted as soon as possible

So basically the nerve is still there and that’s why it is painful. So once you have a proper root canal treatment though it should be fine.

OMG surely this is borderline malpractice?! How can he completely miss your root canal? I'd be complaining about this and expect them to fix things ASAP!

Ask your dentist to make an urgent referral immediately to a local endodontist. It won't be cheap but they do root canals day in and day out. I had a root canal gone wrong with a dentist and after a lot of treatment a couple of panic attacks ended up having the tooth out anyway and an extremely expensive implant.

My husband on the other hand went straight to an endodontist and had no problem. You do need to pay separately to have a crown done if that's needed with a normal dentist.

There shouldn't be any pain when having a root canal. I would not be going back to your dentist for love nor money.

Oh and I'd also be making a complaint. That's an appalling fuck up.

@mjf981 i literally have no idea. Where the filling ended up wasn’t even close to the tooth!

That's horrific OP! I second orajel - you've got to use it carefully as it's basically a weakened benzocaine numbing gel so you can overdose, but I've found it helps with root canal pain.

I would be putting in a serious complaint - if you've paid for those treatments, you should be refunded and they should be making it good. I am so confused how he managed to drill into your gum and put a filling there instead of your root - they look totally different when you're in the tooth, and he should have been using tools telling him when he was near the bottom of the root! It's an absolute disgrace. I wouldn't see that dentist again either - they also shouldn't be making you wait until the 29th imo as they've made this huge feckup and left you in agony.

Really clean the gap with antiseptic mouthwash and then pack it with cotton wool, change the cotton wool frequently. Closing over the exposed nerve makes a huge difference

@TooManyPJs is that something I could get on the NHS? I am lucky in that I get free NHS treatment as I’m a single parent, so at least I haven’t paid for the trauma. It’s my first root canal and I read about them online beforehand and was under the impression it shouldn’t be painful, but honestly both appointments were worse than childbirth. My body must have gone into shock towards the end as I was literally shaking. I’m so scared to go back but I know I have to. Luckily the other dentist at the practice is very good, I’ve seen him before.

The whole thing with the new dentist I saw was a shitshow. He ended up going to see the other dentist 3 times for a second opinion during my appointments, for basic stuff like trying to work out which tooth needed work (I knew full well which tooth as it was agony but he said he couldn’t see anything wrong with it on the x rays). And then of course I got a filling put in my gum. I feel like I should complain but to who?

That’s a first premolar not a canine.
It’s also perforated. Either referral to specialist endodontist or extraction IMO.
Is the dentist fairly young?

@yonce I’ll see if I can get some orajel today. To be fair, I wasn’t in any pain whilst the temporary filling was there, it’s only because it’s come out now that it’s hurting. I probably would have been seen sooner if I hadn’t gone away for 2 weeks, it was all very bad timing.