Re: Root Canals (and Pulpotomies)

March 13, 2002

While we are on the subject of root canals, I am wondering if anyone has

any insights on Pulpotomies (baby teeth root canals).

Two of my children had pulpotomies, and I am afraid that my youngest may

have some decay that is so deep that they will recommend pulpotomies for

some of her teeth (haven't taken her to the dentist yet, partly because I

know that our family dentist will want to send her to a pediatric dentist

and I don't care for the pediatric dentist that I had to take one of my

other kids to, and I also don't think my 5yo would cooperate very well

with some other dentist besides our family dentist whom she has known all

her life and has looked forward to going to all of her life!).

With my son, his pulpotomy didn't do well. He ended up getting an abcess

in that tooth after the pulpotomy, and so the pediatric dentist replaced

the filling with a temporary one which she said would need replacing in 6

months or a year, but we never did get it replaced. He still has the

temp filling--several years later, and that tooth is very loose now.

Anyway, for a while he would get a sore on his gum over that tooth (an

upper tooth). I would give him liquid garlic (Kyolic brand) in apple

juice when that sore would crop up and after a while the sore would heal

up. So we managed to keep the abcess under control, although we didn't

really get it totally gone I don't believe. I wasn't real consistent

with the garlic--maybe if I had been, he would have totally gotten rid of

the problem. Now that the tooth is loose and a bit wiggly, his gum has

kind of opened up there, so you can see what is left of the root of that

tooth, and you can see the lower edge of the adult tooth up there that is

ready to come in. I'm hoping that it will heal up o.k., closing back up

as it should after the baby tooth comes out and as the adult tooth comes

in. (I'm thinking I may use some sort of comfrey poultice on it, since

that is good for healing body tissues.) If anyone has any suggestions

about this I would be glad to hear them. Or if anyone else has had this

sort of problem I would like to hear about that, too.

Thanks.

Bonnie in NC

________________________________________________________________

GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO!

Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less!

Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit:

Recommended Posts