Teeth - general queries

[shen]

Notsparklynow: I'm sorry you are having problems with your dentist. I totally sympathise, my last dentist was adamant that EDS didnt affect teeth ('I studied chronic illness and dental problems and EDS/HMS didnt come up' yes 15 years ago, it's changed a bit since then) and refused to believe me when I said that the anesthetic didnt work. I now have quite a large fear of dentists thanks to this idiot. I would give him the information, and if he doesnt read it, find another dentist. If you let him do the work, let him know when it hurts and tell him to stop, dont take no for an answer in this. Painful dental treatment is horrible. (My dentist didnt listen so I ended up biting him it was an accident i swear! ) Can you take someone with you for a bit of moral support? I'm 23 and will rarely go by myself i'm so scared and nervous of them, having someone there really can help. The iPod sounds like a good idea to distract but try to be forceful with him, if it hurts make him stop. Sorry if that is all a bit jumbled and doesnt make much sense.

My teeth are being awful lately. I had an abscess in my lower back tooth, and had emergency root canal about a month ago. The last few days though its got very painful and any pressure on the tooth hurts and its all throbby, my face has swollen up and is warm to the touch and its tender to touch along the jaw line too. It seems the temporary filling has cracked and sunk a bit. Its only been in a couple of weeks and i've avoided hard food and such, have had a had bout of acid reflux though so that might not have helped. I don't have a dentist though so I guess i'll have to go back to the emergency dentist and get them to patch me up again until I can get assigned a new dentist (i hope a good one). I hope the infection hasnt gone down in the bone. *sigh*

[Rosie]

Hi Shen

What you describe sounds like an infection in the root canal, so do go back soon. I have had so much work done on my teeth, including about 12 root canalc, no fun at all! I now only have 18 teeth, plus 2 retained roots that won't take crowns. All ,my teeth have fillings, all over the place. I a,m very nervous of going to the dentist. It wasn't so bad when I saw the same one regularly as he had learnt that local didn't work well fo rme, but I had some horrid experiences (including an extraction i could feel) on the way!
Do be firm with them.

Rosie

[shen]

Rosie, I can totally relate, I had so much work done by my idiotic dentist without proper pain relief, root canal, fillings etc. When I was 8 another dentist he numbed the wrong side of my mouth and pulled out my tooth on the other side I felt everything, he said i was being a baby and he couldn't possibly of made that mistake. I never went back to him. They are the reason I am afraid of dentists.

Managed to get hold of the Dental Access Centre, it's thursday before I can see them, I could go today but im not sure how swollen my face is, I have odd perception and i cant really see when things are swollen. It feels it though and I think it is from looking in the mirror, but decided not to risk being turned away because its insanely cold outside and I dont want to go out for no reason. So thursday it is.

[Hele]

Hi,
I don't have a query regarding teeth but need to sound off I am afraid. I had the most toe curling experience at the dentist, have had to change to another dentist in my practice as I can't manage the stairs up to my old dentist, wasn't too worried as not been a patient of the other dentist for long as my lovely dentist has left. Anyway had a tooth crumble last week and she saw me and fixed it, she did have a slightly strange attitude then, but yesterday she was horrible, she kept asking me how often I clean my teeth and wouldn't listen when i assured her i clean them twice a day every day, and floss and use a little brush between my teeth, she simply wouldn't believe me, kept lecturing me on cleaning tecniques, on and on, told me to buy a new electric toothbrush instead of my battery one, (which I was more than happy to take on board). I tried to explain about the EDS but she obviously didn't know what it was and discounted it having anything to do with my teeth, then said she would clean them, I warned her they were very sensitive, and my god did it hurt, I so tried not to react, but was in tears, and all in front of my 11yr old son. I slapped on the usual smile as I got up from the chair, but when home got very upset and it is really bothering me, I feel so humiliated. I know I do have a low pain threshold with dental pain, but I had just taken my afternoon pain killer, and 24hrs later teeth still hurt.
Think I will have to change dentists
Hele

[christianne]

Oh Hele I feel for you and all the rest of you with your teeth problems. I too need loads of anaesthetic so that all one side of my face can't move ! I am lucky and relieved to have an understanding dentist though, and especially so since we discovered I react badly(i.e. by passing out) if I have anaesthetic with adrenaline in. I now have a different dental anaesthetic called citanest and that is fine for me. I always have horrid face aching, neck ache and jaw ache after having anything done though i guess it is just par for the course with EDS.....Anyway sympathy winging its way to all of you,
Christianne

[DeeNJai]

I have problems with bleeding gums and nothing I do makes them stop. I had major problems with overgrowding I had to have 8 teeth removed before I could have my brace fitted and they took them all out at once at the dentist. The worse one was the tooth that came through the roof of the mouth that was very painful to remove and it was again do under a local. Had to have many of milk teeth out because they wont fall out by themself. I also have impacted wisdom teeth two where taken out be the dentist and then other two had to be removed at the hospital as I had to have a general because they where very impacted.

My front teeth feel loose but they are fine, the dentist recommends that I see the hygienist every 3 months because of the bleeding gums. I use a toothpaste that the dentist recommended Corsodyl Dental Gel and its not badly priced about £3.00 for 50g but it last a while. I do find if I eat crisps the roof of my mouth feels sore I get bits of skin coming away from it. I need to make an appointment with my dentist this month because I havent seen her for over a year now. I find that my jaw hurts a lot when I eat food that is slightly hard or have to chew them for a while,
dee

[Fiona-Jane]

hiya,

my gums have bled since my adult teeth came through and no one could find a cause so i just have to make sure i keep my teeth nice and clean and use antibacterial mouthwash everyday and a course of that corsodil stuff every few months. when i was a kid they assumed it was something i was doing to myself for attention!

i've switched to a childs smaller, softer toothbrush and the bleeding has slowed down a touch and i've noticed that when i've been too ill to get out of bed and brush them for a few days the bleeding often stops completely (unless i then eat hard food such as raw carrrot etc). thats very interesting! over the last few years i;ve tried every type of toothbrush on the market and they all make them bleed so i've resigned myself to always having bleeding gums.


i get the same thing with the crisps and any other crunchy/hard foods and also had many teeth out due to overcrowding (all without adequate pain relief as the injection never works in the tooth (but works ok on the skin of my face, so that goes numb but the actual tooth doesnt) and no dentist believed me). also have a few slightly wobbly teeth that hurt a little sometimes but as i cant get a dentist now i've been diagnosed with EDS i'm trying to ignore them.

i've got a broken filling in one of my molars that's been broken since it was first put in- new dentist noticed the drill was hurting me so panicked and didnt do the filling properly so half fell out straight away. but she didnt want to fix it as that would involve drilling it out etc (even though i was happy for her to keep drilling, i'm used to that pain by now, it;s nothing compared to having those teeth out....). but she refused and looked terrifed so stuck that plastic stuff on my teeth (a bit like cling film that they heat up and stick to the teeth once they've cleaned them all really well). that's broken down now as it was years and years ago so little bits of that filling keep breaking off. every now and then it hurts a lot but at the moment its ok, and hope it stays ok for a while longer as i'd need to get admitted to hospital to have it fixed under a general anaesthetic....

gosh, how did dentists cope before local anaesthetic! i'd see the point of them not wanting to drill if it was blatently obvious that it's hurting but i'm really good at hiding the pain and that dentist only saw as she looked into my eyes as exactly the right moment, .


fi xx

[Spireite]

Fiona-Jane I'm glad I'm not the only one where the 'local' doesn't work where it is injected but can numb under the eye or the side of the nose instead and the dentist won't believe me.

[catswhiskas38]

hi i have same trouble with my teeth mind i am really scared again bad experiences like when i was a child one dentist doing fillings i didnt need i have same trouble with the local anasetic my dentist has given me 3 or 4 before theyve had any effect and shes said ive had enough 2 knock a horse out i dont no if its cause i get a lot of pain and am on quite a bit of medication as ive slso got osteoarthritis which i have found out you can get it with hms my dad had same trouble with his teeth and in the end he had them all out they gave him dentures but he couldnt wear them they used two make him bork im only one in the family with hms so it can be frustrating .

[midnightangel]

I have not been on here in a very long time but things are really getting me down. Not only have I just been diagnosed with scleritis, but my teeth are in trouble too.
I went to the dentist asking for help with the recession and old fillings that I am really conscious of and essentially I got told off! In a nice enough way, she said my gums were receding, and that they bleed a lot, and that I had to look after them better before she would consider fixing the look of the fillings etc.
I explained that I brushed, flossed, mouthwashed etc like woman possessed, so she then said it must be my technique at fault! (I'm an ex dental nurse, so that is not likely!)
I plan to print off some of the info about gum/teeth problems and EDS to give her for my next visit, as I knew there was no point in trying without facts to back it up when I was there in the hope that she will see that I am doing my best and need help not have treatment withheld as a 'punishment' for not doing a better job, when I am doing all I can!
Rant over!

[gila]

if your dentist in the end does come up with something else that can be done re receeding gums...please tell me!
my dentist always says "there's nothing else apart from proper hygenie" and the 'more than normal' recession could be due to the HMS/EDS...
sounds like earlyish dentures here I come... sigh...
xxg

[midnightangel]

Well, I am going back armed with all the info I can, prepared to fight my corner...so I will let you know! Probably won't get very far, but I'm not going go down without a fight

[Jill]

Dentists dealing with gums are called periodontists, they can do specialized teeth and gums cleaning and give you additional hygiene recommendations. Have you seen one of them?

[louloutinks]

Hi,

new here. I have the receding gums and I also have lots of crowns/teeth pulled and fillings. Guaranteed when I go to the dentist I will need more fillings despite looking after my teeth. I have also had the lectures on how many times to clean my teeth, use floss etc.. The thing is when use floss is that some days I can get it in between my teeth and other days there is no way it will go between them....like they move. I am terrified of the dentist as I feel so much and it hurts. If they fit a crown then I know that I will be having that tooth removed soon! My fillings stay in but my teeth tend to break around the fillings! I had a wisdom tooth out and it was a terrible ordeal. It took nearly 2 hours with a local and 3 dentists all having a go. The tooth had such bent roots that they had to cut away some of my jaw bone too as they were 'fused' and he asked if I would mind if he kept it to show students at college!! Lost lots of blood and fainted as I walked out the dentist room!

My mum and Nan were very unfortunate - they had to have all their top teeth removed in their 20's. Now my son who is only 8 has had 7 major fillings that were completed in Nov 2010 and he had an appointment in Jan and now he needs more - I am really concerned his teeth are going to have the same issues but earlier.

I did ask Prof G about it and its relation to EDS but he didn't really answer so am not sre if my teeth issues are related to EDS.

Very interesting reading through this thread!

Tinks

[Stone]

All very EDS-like. All teeth move a little (they're held into the jaw with ligaments between bone and root) but our ligaments are stretchier so ours move a bit more. Don't play with them too much and they'll last longer Bleeding is common too as our gums are more delicate than normal - so dentists often accuse us of not brushing enough cos they bleed as they're poking around!

I had one baby tooth fail to come out (it died and went numb but stayed stuck in!) - that had one root three times longer than the others and sharply hooked over. They used a hell of a lot of local to get it all numb and I drooled uncontrollably all afternoon I also have a very high, arched palate and overcrowding - I had 4 removed to make space for my wisdom teeth, one of which then grew in so impacted the top faces forwards!

Stone