From: skaamjm@ucl.ac.uk (Matthew Moore)
Newsgroups: sci.med
Subject: Re: wisdom teeth removal
Date: 4 Sep 92 16:22:16 GMT
Organization: Bloomsbury Computing Consortium

oispeggy@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (Peggy Brown) writes:

>In article <des.24@helix.nih.gov>, des@helix.nih.gov (David E. Scheim) writes...
>>In article <KPC.92Sep1172935@zog.arc.nasa.gov> kpc@pluto.arc.nasa.gov (k p c) writes:
>> 
>>>does anybody have any wisdom to offer to a 27 year old who has to have
>>>all 4 wisdom teeth removed?
>> 
>> 
>>I was told by several dentists in my 20s, 20 years ago, to have my wisdom 
>>teeth removed.  I ignored them and my teeth have been fine all these years.  
>>I'm sure there are times when it's a good idea to preempt later problems by 
>>removing wisdom teeth but I suspect some dentists are a bit overzealous and 
>>may create problems where none exist.
>> 

>I had the same experience.  From my late teens to mid-30's 
>several dentists tried to talk me into having my wisdom teeth 
>removed.  I refused.  At age 30 I let a dentist pull 1 wisdom 
>tooth.  It had broken through the surface of the gum, and 
>although not decayed, he convinced me it was likely to decay 
>since its harder to keep it clean.  Piece of cake.  It was out in 
>2 seconds; I felt nothing; and there was little pain afterwards.

>My other 3 were deeply impacted below the gumline and sideways.  
>Recently an oral surgeon scared the sh*t out of me by saying that

>  1.) He could guarantee the teeth would cause me problems and
>      an infection in one is very painful, and the older you get
>      the worse it is to recover from the surgery.  He had 
>      removed them in people over age 50 and its just that much
>      more miserable.

>  2.) The longer you let it go the more it messes up the *bone*
>      underneath the teeth and the more likely the bone won't
>      fill in and you'll lose the molar preceding the wisdom
>      tooth too.

>  3.) For some reason, they seem to act up often in pregnant 
>      women.  Something about increased swelling of tissues.

>Anyway, he sufficiently scared me so I let him take them out.  I 
>wanted all 3 out at once.  He said he'd do one side, and see how
>I was before deciding about the other side.  I'm easy to work on, 
>and they weren't as bad to remove as he'd anticipated, so he took
>out all 3 at the same time.  I just had shots of novocaine for 
>the pain.  Didn't feel a thing, but it gave me a lot of 
>anxiety because I could hear snapping and crunching.  All and all 
>the surgery was much easier than I anticipated.

>The recovery was awful.  I swelled up enormously and took lots of 
>pain medication.  The first medication, with codeine, made me 
>throw-up the first time I took it, which is just great after oral 
>surgery.  The swelling was bad for 3 days and I kept ice on it 
>nearly the entire time and it finally started to go down.  Now I 
>feel fine.  

>If your wisdom teeth have broken through the gum it may not be so 
>bad.

>Good luck,

>- Peggy -

Er, my milage varies....

My wisdom teeth are also impacted, lie with the tops facing forwards,
well below the gum. The dental surgeons at University College Hospital
dental school (London), who do not have a financial interest in
recommending treatment, proposed a conservative appraoch, ie do
nothing, its far better to leave 'em buried, wouldnt go near them with
a six foot pole, was (almost) exactly what they said. 

They did say that that there was a small chance of problems later, but
overall, it would be better to cross that bridge when coming to it.