Oral surgeon refusing to sedate me bc of my weight

[Missymajor]

I am getting all four wisdom teeth out soon and just found out the oral surgeon who was going to do the procedure is refusing because he found out my weight. I am a super morbidly obese woman which apparently puts me at higher risk for complications while undergoing anesthesia. The dentists office told me they have another oral surgeon who will be willing to work with me so they rescheduled my appointment but now I’m so scared I don’t know what to do. It took so long for me to even gather up the courage to make the first appointment bc I’m so scared of doctors and I’ve never had any sort of surgery and now I’m so scared something is going to happen to me while I’m under. The only comfort I have is saying to myself “well If I die maybe it’ll be painless bc I’ll be sedated”. I don’t know if the office offers local anesthesia and even if they do the thought of being awake during the procedure is terrifying to me. I swear I’m so close to just canceling the whole thing indefinitely and I would if my wisdom teeth weren’t infected and causing me pain

 

[comfortdentist]

If you have a significantly compromised airway and most every significantly obese person does it is best to just have local or local and nitrous oxide. Otherwise there is a risk of death and it's not worth it.

 

[Missymajor]

Why are they letting me get sedated with another surgeon if there’s a possibility I could die? No one has mentioned to me that I could die. I only found out from googling. Now I’m not even sure I want to go to this dentist anymore to get it done because they already seem like they’re being irresponsible in dealing with me.

I would be happy to do local if I was sure I wouldn’t feel any pain but I’ve been reading so many stories about people who said it was the worst experience of their life. Also my paper the dentist gave me says my wisdom teeth are impacted and I’m reading online that dentists won’t removed impacted wisdom teeth with only local anesthesia. Doesn’t impacted mean you can’t see them? I can see all my wisdom teeth. Is it possible they wrote it down wrong?

If I decide not to get my wisdom teeth out at all I’m afraid the pain is gonna get worse and I’m gonna get really sick but honestly I’m kind of leaning that way right now bc I’m so scared and overwhelmed.

 

[MountainMama]

I am not a dentist so can’t offer advice, but I just wanted to offer support. I would be scared as well. I can tell you that I have a hard time getting numb with local anesthetic (had terrible experiences as a kid that led to my dental fear). I have had to have four teeth extracted over the past two years, three of them molars. I had nitrous oxides along with the local, as comfortdentist suggested. The nitrous oxide makes you relax so that the local anesthesia works better. I felt no pain during my extractions at all.
I do know that impaction can vary. I had fully impacted wisdom teeth so that all of mine were under the gums and some were sideways. I had to get them out under general anesthesia. My husband’s were partially impacted, so that some of the tooth was above the gum line. He had local anesthesia and nitrous. His were straight though and not sideways.
It would be worth calling the surgeon’s office and asking for a conversation about how it will be done so that you are safe. You need to feel safe going in and know they have a plan that will ensure your safety. Maybe the other surgeon has experience with obese patients?
I am not in the medical or dental field but it seems that there has to be some way to do it safely. Maybe a lighter sedation? I have only ever had nitrous/local or general, but others have talked about conscious sedation or twilight sedation.

 

[Enarete]

I would be happy to do local if I was sure I wouldn’t feel any pain but I’ve been reading so many stories about people who said it was the worst experience of their life. Also my paper the dentist gave me says my wisdom teeth are impacted and I’m reading online that dentists won’t removed impacted wisdom teeth with only local anesthesia. Doesn’t impacted mean you can’t see them? I can see all my wisdom teeth. Is it possible they wrote it down wrong?

If I decide not to get my wisdom teeth out at all I’m afraid the pain is gonna get worse and I’m gonna get really sick but honestly I’m kind of leaning that way right now bc I’m so scared and overwhelmed.

Missymajor, sorry to read about your situation and I would say wisdom teeth is a sensitive topic for pretty much everyone. It is ok to be scared. With that being said, being scared doesn't mean there is a higher chance of things going wrong. I see a sense of you not having control here, worrying about pain, having read all those stories, but the important thing to remember is that YOU are in control. You really are.

With dentistry you will always find people who had bad experience and enjoy writing about it, but here is the thing: don't you wonder why anyone would endure pain and go through it instead of interrupting, asking for more anaesthetic, asking for a break etc.? About 10 to 30 years ago there was still the expectation that dentistry is painful and that's the way it is, but things have changed. There is anaesthetic and oral surgeons in particular are familiar with many many ways to make it effective. So if pain during the procedure is something you are worried about, please, talk to the dentist and allow him to explain how they will make sure you will feel comfortable and also, what would be the plan B should you feel anything (will they try a different anesthetic? will they try different technique? will they leave the anesthetic more time to take effect? will they reschedule?).

You mentioned reading dentists won't remove impacted teeth with just local.. well, I can only encourage you to look around, get in touch with practices, explain your situation and ask. You are the person who decides how you would like to have something done, not the dentist. I wrote it somewhere here in the last days I think; there are definitely members of the forum who had impacted teeth removed with just a local. I myself had all of my four teeth out and it was the shortest procedure I ever had at the dentist and I didn't even noticed as it was over. And by the way, you are the person to decide which oral surgeon you like enough to work with them. I know it doesn't feel like this now and that you are scared, but you are still a customer. It is ok to ask as many questions as you like and get as many information (from the dentist) as you need to feel safe and comfortable. It's a good thing to need a bit of trust before wanting to let someone get out any teeth!

 

[geos]

I’m not a dentist, but I believe a surgeon would need to have a consult before working on you. Has that happen? A surgeon should be able to tell you at that point how comfortable they are about doing the procedure. As Enarete says, the most important part is that you are in control.