Root Canal Infection – Causes, Symptoms and Treatment

Sometimes you may feel severe pain while chewing or while any pressure is applied to that particular part of your mouth; you may be facing sensitivity from longer period of time (when you eat or drink anything hot or cold) or you may notice discoloration of your tooth.

These are nothing but indications that you might need a root canal therapy now. Apart from the above mentioned symptoms there may be chance that you might feel swelling or tenderness in the gums or there may be a pimple inside your mouth on the gums that may come and go frequently. Root canal infection may or may not show the above mentioned symptoms; it has been noticed that sometimes no such symptoms are seen even if you have the same problem.

What is Root Canal Infection?

Root canal infection is caused when you have severally damaged tooth and pulp (pulp or pulp chamber is the soft area that lies inside the centre of your tooth) inside it also damaging thus causing the bacteria to multiply and spread inside the pulp chamber.

Root canal Treatment

Root canal treatment is basically done to repair the damaging tooth. The process of treating the root canal infection involves the following steps:

• You may need to visit to the dental clinic more than one time for getting your root canal treatment done.
• The initial step involves taking an X-ray to have information about the shape of root canals and find out if you notice any further chance of infection in the surrounding bones.
• Next comes the anesthesia that will make the area near tooth insensitive so that the complete procedure can be performed without any difficulty
• After anesthesia an opening is made into the tooth to remove the diseased and infected tooth pulp that carries bacteria, decayed nerve tissue and related remains that may cause further infection. After the opening is made, the infected pulp is completely removed.
• Sodium hypochlorite or simple water should be used at regular intervals to clean the remains.
• After the tooth is properly cleaned, the process of filling the roots that were opened to remove the pulp is carried out. A material called gutta-percha is used to fill the gap and then it is sealed off.
• Some dentists do not put the seal immediately. If in case there is an infection they prefer putting the medication inside the tooth for cleaning up the infection. While some dentists do it at the same day when it cleaned out.
• If the filling is not done on the same day the dentists put a temporary filling in the exterior part of the hole and you will have to make another visit for the interior filling of the tooth.
• The last step involves the restoration of the tooth as it is necessary to place a crown or other restoration to keep it protected from any breakage.
• If you still have any doubts regarding the treatment of root canal infection you can visit to a good dentist and get all your doubts cleared.