N
nightsong
Junior member
- Joined
- Feb 12, 2007
- Messages
- 19
Well, I went 
What a lovely dentist. He was so gentle, NOTHING hurt - the x-rays, the exam, pulling out the broken filling and putting in the temporary one. So far, so very good.
Gordon, thank you so much for your help. And harper and mkayy, you were so supportive and kind, many thanks to you too.
OK, I still have a couple of supplementary questions if Gordon isn't too sick of me. Unfortunately I forgot to take my printout of the other thread, being a bit distracted with all the crying I was doing before I went. So although I explained about my sensitivities and allergies, i din't say about possibly going to hospital for testing with the anaesthetics.
He was a very experienced dentist, 60-ish I should think. Like you he said he'd never seen a bad reaction to modern anaesthetics though he did occasionally see them in the past with the old-style drugs. I gather they had much more adrenaline in for one thing.
He accpted that I was allergic to Valium, and that I'm not sure if I can take antibiotics. He was fine about using a non-epi local. His suggetion is that I have this quite big filling (it is on a bottom pre-molar) without anaesthetic and see how I get on. if it hurts too much he will stop, and either patch it up again with another temporary filling, or give me the local and carry on. He obviously thinks I will be absolutely fine with the shot. He also said it was a good sign that's he'd been able to do the work on the tooth so far without me feeling any discomfort, though to be fair the only drilling involved was when he was shaping the top of the tooth afterwards.
If this works he is proposing working on my molar with the huge temporary filling, also without pain relief. He does seem rather less convinced this will be possible though.
So my questions are -
1. Is there any way to tell in advance how much this will hurt? How relevant is his skill level? He does seem very good and I have a surprisingly high level of trust in him - it turns out he is my GP's dentist which also seems like a good sign!
2. He said some of his patients don't have anaesthetics and say they don't feel any pain. Again, is this a) because they have unusually high pain thresholds, b) because he is very skillful, c) because they are very drunk?
3, If pain relief is the road I want to take, should I insist on the in-hospital testing, or just trust him (and you) and go for it at the time? Or ask him to inject me first, to see if I'm ok, without doing the work necessarily? He is happy to spend time which is wonderful, so I don't think he'll mind too much if I turn up for the filling but end up asking for something else this time.
I can't really believe I have got this far. It feels a bit like a dream at the moment. The best bit was that my gums are fine and my dental hygiene is apparently very good
. I was astonished, I thought there would be a major lecture about how badly I was brushing my teeth - I can't get on with my electric toothbrush for one thing, and guiltily abandoned it years ago.
There may be a bit of an element of minimising problems I suppose, but the x-rays looked all right to my untutored eyes. Oh well, one step at a time!
I will try to stop with the endless questions, Gordon, and take myself off to another forum after this
What a lovely dentist. He was so gentle, NOTHING hurt - the x-rays, the exam, pulling out the broken filling and putting in the temporary one. So far, so very good.Gordon, thank you so much for your help. And harper and mkayy, you were so supportive and kind, many thanks to you too.
OK, I still have a couple of supplementary questions if Gordon isn't too sick of me. Unfortunately I forgot to take my printout of the other thread, being a bit distracted with all the crying I was doing before I went. So although I explained about my sensitivities and allergies, i din't say about possibly going to hospital for testing with the anaesthetics.
He was a very experienced dentist, 60-ish I should think. Like you he said he'd never seen a bad reaction to modern anaesthetics though he did occasionally see them in the past with the old-style drugs. I gather they had much more adrenaline in for one thing.
He accpted that I was allergic to Valium, and that I'm not sure if I can take antibiotics. He was fine about using a non-epi local. His suggetion is that I have this quite big filling (it is on a bottom pre-molar) without anaesthetic and see how I get on. if it hurts too much he will stop, and either patch it up again with another temporary filling, or give me the local and carry on. He obviously thinks I will be absolutely fine with the shot. He also said it was a good sign that's he'd been able to do the work on the tooth so far without me feeling any discomfort, though to be fair the only drilling involved was when he was shaping the top of the tooth afterwards.
If this works he is proposing working on my molar with the huge temporary filling, also without pain relief. He does seem rather less convinced this will be possible though.
So my questions are -
1. Is there any way to tell in advance how much this will hurt? How relevant is his skill level? He does seem very good and I have a surprisingly high level of trust in him - it turns out he is my GP's dentist which also seems like a good sign!
2. He said some of his patients don't have anaesthetics and say they don't feel any pain. Again, is this a) because they have unusually high pain thresholds, b) because he is very skillful, c) because they are very drunk?
3, If pain relief is the road I want to take, should I insist on the in-hospital testing, or just trust him (and you) and go for it at the time? Or ask him to inject me first, to see if I'm ok, without doing the work necessarily? He is happy to spend time which is wonderful, so I don't think he'll mind too much if I turn up for the filling but end up asking for something else this time.
I can't really believe I have got this far. It feels a bit like a dream at the moment. The best bit was that my gums are fine and my dental hygiene is apparently very good
. I was astonished, I thought there would be a major lecture about how badly I was brushing my teeth - I can't get on with my electric toothbrush for one thing, and guiltily abandoned it years ago.There may be a bit of an element of minimising problems I suppose, but the x-rays looked all right to my untutored eyes. Oh well, one step at a time!
I will try to stop with the endless questions, Gordon, and take myself off to another forum after this
and your most welcome anytime i enjoy helping people(or trying anyway) i dont really know about the local thing but i would have thought it is fairly painful. i have gone without but only on a rct front tooth so it was dead anyway. i used to cringe at the thought of it but actually it was ok. i did have one time when i felt something but thats wasnt drilling but when he was cleaning them out but he stopped instantly and put some la in there. ive got this terrible habit of trying to leap out of the chair 
)....personally I'd do anything including i/v sedation, to avoid having to repeat such an experience but presumably this isn't an option for you. One poster on here used hypnosis which partially worked, for invasive treatment but I thought that approach was unnecessary as needle phobia was the reason for not wanting LA.
