Root Canal – painless and in one visit , Seattle Washington

Root Canal - painless and in one visit

Having your Seattle dentist tell you that you need a root canal performed on a tooth has traditionally been one of the most fear-provoking things a dentist could say to a patient. Most people’s fears are not based on any experience, just horror stories from friends or relatives and the stigma associated with the words “root canal”.

Other patients that are fearful of root canal therapy actually have had a previous bad experience. Some remember the multiple visits and many hours that their root canal took to complete, or the pain that they suffered during the treatment.

The time required to perform a root canal has been greatly reduced by the introduction of new techniques. These techniques have also help alleviate some of the potential for discomfort. Root canal therapy can now usually be completed in only one visit to your Seattle dentist.

Root canals now usually take between 30 and 60 minutes, on average. Front teeth, such as incisors and premolars, usually take about 30 minutes to complete, while back teeth, the molars, usually take about an hour.

Many people wonder how this is possible. It is possible because of new technology that has been introduced that is utilized for root canal therapy. A great deal of the work performed when shaping the inside of the roots of the tooth can now be done with versatile dental files that are mounted on low speed dental drills. There have also been advances in how the tooth roots are shaped and how they are filled, which have greatly accelerated the speed and accuracy of the procedure.

So, we now know that root canals are performed in a fraction of the time they used to take to be completed. Are they still painful? The very comforting answer is “no” – in the majority of cases, root canals are completed painlessly. A Seattle dentist uses several methods to help alleviate pain during a typical root canal: administration of Ibuprophen before treatment, use of long-acting anesthesia, numbing the inside of tooth after the anesthesia, application of topical anesthesia on the dental files during the procedure, and administration of other medications like nitrous oxide or Valium..

Once the root canal is completed, it is typical to experience some discomfort for a few days. Most patients find that over the counter drugs, such as Ibrupophen or Naproxen, are quite effective in elimination this discomfort, but your Seattle dentist can prescribe something more potent if necessary or desired.

The bottom line is that you should ignore the old stigma associated with root canals, because today painless, one-visit root canals can now be performed.