Yesterday, at 8:00, I went to my regular dentist to get a toothache checked out, and discovered, (not a surprise) that I needed a root canal. Dentist says, this tooth has taken it’s knocks through the years, no surprise that it died.

You don’t like this sort of thing, you might want to go over to Lileks and look at some pictures of matchbooks for a while.

Today, at 10:00, at the endodontist, I had the root canal. Yeah, I just had a wisdom tooth removed 8 days ago, and yeah, it still hurts like a banshee. Vicodin is your friend. My jaw has been everted twice in a little over a week.

Anyway, you live, and you learn things. Today, I had a talkative dentist. He told me everything he was doing, and why, and how.

First of all, I hate needles. No, I mean, I HATE needles. My veins collapse in the presence of needles, and I hate to see them pointed at me.

I hate pain, on the other hand, especially dental pain, a LOT more. So I put up with the needles.

Ever wonder why the dentist uses those big old fashonedy-looking needles, with the big finger loops and stuff, instead of the modern style disposables everyone else on earth uses? Well, I’ll tell you. It’s because a dentist often has to go poking around bone (often even inside bone) to get the meds where they need to be. They need the strength and control of the big heavy needle to poke around in your jaw. (all this is according to my endodontist; if you doubt the veracity don’t look at me.)
Anyway, I get several injections. As the first ones kick in, the later ones are easer, due to my not knowing they’re coming. I lie to the dentist a bit, and tell him I’m still feeling pain when I’m not- I want him putting PLENTY of juice in me. I don’t want to feel a thing. He does, and soon enough, we’re drilling away.

The before and after pictures of the procedure are as follows:
before.jpg after.jpg

How my dentist looked at the picture on the left and decided I need a root canal is beyond me, but I took his word for it, because it hurt.

The picture on the right shows the finished procedure, and you can see there are new “additions” in the tooth. The endodontist drills down to the “pulp” of the tooth and clears that all out, then uses special files called “broaches” to rout out and enlarge the channels in the teeth that are normally filled with nerves and blood vessels.

The now enlarged holes are cleaned, dried, and filled with a material called “gutta percha”, which is a substance made from the sap of the Isonandra Gutta tree, native to the Malay Peninsula. Gutta percha was the world’s first “plastic” in that it’s soft when warm, hard at room temperature, and a good insulator of heat and electricity. (gutta percha was first used to insulate telegraph cables) When the root canals are filled the gutta percha is glued in place with a special polymer, and the hole sealed with a temporary filling and antiseptic medecine. I’ll go back to my regular dentist next week for a proper filling. Normally, a root canal would also involve a crown and a post, but since this tooth had already been capped, the dentist will merely fill the cap.