R
realh
Member
- Joined
- Jul 30, 2012
- Messages
- 46
I've been getting intermittent pain on the right side of my mouth for a few years now, and it's getting worse. Almost unbearable for the last week or so. No one tooth seems to be especially sensitive to cold or tapping at the moment and I can't tell what's causing the pain. Usually it feels more like the pain is on the top, but occasionally from the bottom. Attacks typically last a couple of weeks and abate for about the same time. Conventional painkillers have little effect, I seem to have to take paracetamol and ibuprofen together or overlapping to get any relief at all. I think it's worse when I'm stressed. Does that sound more like some sort of neuralgia or TMJ than toothache?
About 20 years ago I thought I had toothache near the back of the top jaw on that side, but it turned out to be the lower canine (are the lower ones still called canines?), easily diagnosed when I nearly hit the ceiling when the dentist put a cold swab on it. I got RCT (I think it was at the time when they used to do the whole thing in one appointment, but my dentist at the time didn't have instant X-ray results yet), and I still have that tooth, but it turned grey. Could that root filling have failed? Once or twice that tooth has been painful again, which I could feel when pushing it with my tongue, but it passed after a couple of days.
The only other detectable problem I have in the area now is that the gums between one tooth and those either side of it are chronically inflamed. But I don't think the pain is directly from the gums, they cause a sharper pain when flossed which quickly goes away. The floss sometimes comes out bloody, but not usually smelly or with bits of food. The tooth in the middle is root-filled with a crown. Ditto the one in front. The one behind seems to be almost entirely amalgam filling done years ago. Yes, my teeth are a wreck. Could the sore gums be indicative of a problem in one of those teeth? That's the area where the pain usually feels centered. Also, that root-filled crown had the same problem as I described for the canine, but this one is rather newer. My dentist was going to redo the root filling when that happened a couple of years ago, but by the time of my appointment that pain had gone so we decided to leave it alone.
About 20 years ago I thought I had toothache near the back of the top jaw on that side, but it turned out to be the lower canine (are the lower ones still called canines?), easily diagnosed when I nearly hit the ceiling when the dentist put a cold swab on it. I got RCT (I think it was at the time when they used to do the whole thing in one appointment, but my dentist at the time didn't have instant X-ray results yet), and I still have that tooth, but it turned grey. Could that root filling have failed? Once or twice that tooth has been painful again, which I could feel when pushing it with my tongue, but it passed after a couple of days.
The only other detectable problem I have in the area now is that the gums between one tooth and those either side of it are chronically inflamed. But I don't think the pain is directly from the gums, they cause a sharper pain when flossed which quickly goes away. The floss sometimes comes out bloody, but not usually smelly or with bits of food. The tooth in the middle is root-filled with a crown. Ditto the one in front. The one behind seems to be almost entirely amalgam filling done years ago. Yes, my teeth are a wreck. Could the sore gums be indicative of a problem in one of those teeth? That's the area where the pain usually feels centered. Also, that root-filled crown had the same problem as I described for the canine, but this one is rather newer. My dentist was going to redo the root filling when that happened a couple of years ago, but by the time of my appointment that pain had gone so we decided to leave it alone.