Dentist exposed nerve during filling replacement, what to expect?

[donnieberry]

I’ve had a very large silver filling in one of my first molars for 10+ years, I had to get it replaced with a white filling today due to a chip in the tooth.

During the filling, the dentist found some decay under my filling and while removing it, said they “exposed a small bit of the nerve”, so as a precaution, they have filled it with a temporary filling and I’ve to go back in one months time for the white filling.

What are the chances of my nerve surviving? When can I consider my tooth to be in the clear, 2 weeks? The dentist said is 50:50 but would like to hear others thoughts. They said if I get proper toothache and not just a dull ache and sensitivity, I’ll need a root canal.

I had zero pain or symptoms prior to this by the way.

 

[Gordon]

What are the chances of my nerve surviving?

If I knew the answer to that one I'd be buying a lottery ticket

When can I consider my tooth to be in the clear, 2 weeks?

See above

The dentist said is 50:50 but would like to hear others thoughts.

This is called a "Pulp Exposure".
It depends what the exposure looks like, bright red, bleeding slightly and stopped quickly, good chance it'll recover. Dull or greyish coloured or bleeds a lot? Poor chance. The size of the exposure makes a difference too, as does the type of decay that covered it, soft mushy stuff, poor prognosis, firm leathery stuff, better prognosis.

Your dentist has actually seen it, so their opinion is likely to be the best one

 

[donnieberry]

Thank you for your quick reply as always!!

Following that, I did some research and it seems my dentist may have done a “pulp cap”? How reliable are those in your experience long term? I’ve had one person tell me I’ll 100% need a root canal within a year!

My dentist is an absolute nightmare to get any answers from between appointments so I can’t even find out if that’s what they gave me, I can only assume sadly.

 

[Gordon]

Following that, I did some research and it seems my dentist may have done a “pulp cap”? How reliable are those in your experience long term? I’ve had one person tell me I’ll 100% need a root canal within a year!

Yes, they've done a pulp cap. How reliable they are is based on the state of the exposure as above. Without seeing it I can't really give you any answer at all as to how likely it is to work.

There's a school of thought that it's not worth trying at all, since some are going to fail anyway then why not just go ahead and do the RCT? Others are more conservative, I'm a bit in the middle, especially since you're going to be giving the patient a rather large extra bill if you do the RCT immediately