Some people believe that pain is a reliable guide for when it’s time to visit the dentist. They think that if their teeth and gums don’t hurt, nothing can be wrong or serious.
But in reality, there are many reasons why pain is not a reliable indicator of your oral health.
In this week’s blog from Dental Center 4Smile, find out why pain is not always a sign of problems with your oral health.
Gum disease – periodontitis
Many serious dental conditions won’t cause pain. Gum disease – periodontitis – often does not cause pain, even though it is likely the most challenging oral health condition you may face. Gum disease is linked to heart disease, stroke, cancer, pregnancy complications, and diabetes, but it doesn’t always hurt. Gums will swell. They’ll become red. They may bleed and recede, but they don’t always hurt.
Even with regular and proper brushing, we can’t remove all plaque from our mouths. As plaque builds up on teeth, it pushes the gums away from the base of the tooth. The longer the plaque is there, the further it penetrates under the gum line (carrying thousands of nasty bacteria with it). The bacteria don’t stay there-they spread further into the body, eating away at the jawbone, all without any sense of pain.
Gum disease is the leading cause of tooth loss-not cavities, as many people think!
Dental infection
An infected tooth, which is typically treated with a root canal-endodontic therapy-is known for being painful sometimes. In other cases, this condition, which threatens your teeth, jawbone, and potentially even your life, might not cause any pain at all. That’s because pressure is the primary cause of pain in teeth, but if a tooth has regular drainage, it won’t build up pressure. No pressure means no pain, even though there is a dangerous infection in the tooth.
Teeth without nerves – dead teeth
When an infection kills the nerves in your tooth-or if the nerve has been intentionally removed during prior treatment-the tooth may not hurt. You might feel pain from somewhere else, further along the nerve connected to the tooth.
Or you might experience a phenomenon known as referred pain. In this situation, your brain wrongly “guesses” where the pain is coming from. As a result, you might think you have a headache, when in fact you’re experiencing a toothache.
This can also work the other way-you might think you have a toothache, but the cause is something completely different. The point is: you can’t rely on pain to tell you where the problem is.
Cavities – sometimes pain means it’s already too late
Just like gum disease can be painless, so can tooth decay. Imagine when you get a cut-the deeper the wound, the more it hurts or throbs. The same happens with your teeth. At the beginning of decay, you might feel nothing. But as it progresses deeper and deeper, it reaches the more sensitive parts of the tooth, and then the pain starts. If decay reaches the nerve deeply buried inside the tooth, you’ll probably know it.
By the time a cavity is causing pain, the tooth may already be infected or seriously structurally damaged. Instead of a small filling, you may now need a dental crown, a root canal treatment, or even a tooth extraction and dental implant.
Prevention, not cure – proactive dentistry
As long as you think of dentistry as a reaction to things like pain, you’re putting yourself at a disadvantage when it comes to protecting your oral health. As long as you let pain guide you to notice something is wrong, it may be too late to save your tooth, your gums, or your health without major invasive procedures. In the end, you’ll spend much more time and money trying to restore your smile than if you had just gone for regular dental check-ups.
Proactive dentistry, on the other hand, allows us to intervene before problems become too serious. You may still need restorative dentistry, but it won’t be as invasive or as expensive. And you’ll keep your smile healthy and beautiful.
Have your teeth checked and get tartar cleaned at least twice a year at Dental Center 4Smile. You’ll be informed about the state of your oral health and have the opportunity to respond in time.
Prevention is better than cure!
