John Keigher, DDS, provides a quick overview of patients' basic options when they come in with severe tooth pain or infection. In most cases, there are two options: a Root Canal or a Tooth Extraction.
Video Transcript
Basically, patients come in, and they're typically in pain. For the most part, they are given a couple of options.
The patient's in pain, it's due to maybe a crack or some carriers that have gotten close to the nerve of the tooth. When this happens, there's really one of two treatment options. And that's to either do a Root Canal, and then you need a filling and a crown on the top of the tooth to seal it up.
Or you look at something like an extraction where you would take the tooth out entirely, thus removing the nerve and not requiring any additional treatment.