Everyone either knows someone or has personally experienced for themselves the pain of an impacted wisdom tooth. However, what most people do not realize is that it is not just your wisdom teeth that can become impacted. Your maximal cuspids, also known as your eyeteeth or your canines, can also become impacted. These are the second most likely teeth to have problems with impaction, leading to severe pain and infection. We here at Cameo Dental Specialists are quite familiar with impacted canines and have successfully corrected this condition through a procedure known as "canine exposure."
What is Canine Exposure and How Does it Treat Impacted Teeth?
Tooth impaction occurs when a tooth fails to break through the gums and gets trapped underneath the surface. This condition is extremely painful for many people and, if left untreated, can cause a dangerous infection. Unlike wisdom teeth, which can be removed and are considered largely unnecessary, your canines play a key role in your mouth. They are directly involved in biting and chewing and cannot be simply extracted without causing your teeth from becoming misaligned.
Catching an impacted canine early is vital to ensure it erupts properly. The longer you wait to address it, the worse the outcome can be. If caught early, the tooth can be coaxed out by making space for it. Otherwise, it will require surgical intervention and may also need to be extracted and replaced with a dental implant.
When you have an impacted canine, we will work to try to help it erupt on its own. Sometimes getting it to come out is as straightforward as placing a gap for it to emerge and encouraging it with the aid of dental braces. We will then try to expose the impacted tooth by surgically removing the portion of the gums that are hiding it and removing any baby teeth that may be blocking it.
We will then adhere a bracket attached to a tiny gold chain with bonding material and lead the chain to the wires on the dental braces. Next, we will suture the gums closed again so that only the chain is visible. A few weeks later, we will attach a rubber band to that chain and, over the next year, begin the slow and careful process of encouraging the impacted tooth out. This entire process is a fine balance of getting the tooth to become exposed without causing it to become accidentally extracted.
From start to finish, the entire procedure to expose your impacted canine takes between 75 minutes to 105 minutes, depending on if only one side is being worked on or both. It can be performed with either IV sedation or local anesthesia and nitrous oxide (laughing gas). A little bit of bruising and swelling can be expected afterward, and you can take over the counter pain relievers such as ibuprofen or acetaminophen if you experience any discomfort. A diet of soft foods is advised in the week following. After a week to ten days, we will follow up with you to make sure you are healing properly, and your progress is going as expected.
If you suspect that you may have an impacted canine, or if you are interested in learning more about them and the process of exposing them, we here at Cameo Dental Specialists are more than happy to answer any of your questions! To schedule an appointment or for more information, give us a call at (708) 456-7787 today!