So I was trying to decide to talk about my broken tooth first or my file server first. Broken tooth won. Most likely because it’s a much shorter blog entry. Haha. My file server entry could probably fill up 3 or 4 regular blog entries in length. Currently I’m resizing my RAID 5 array since I picked up another Seagate 500GB 7200.10 hard drive.
Anyway, lots of people have given me suggestions and once again, thanks to Xyon for referring Dr. Im from Sunrise Dental. I had mistakenly heard Dr. Ian, but the receptionist on the phone must’ve heard it correctly since I did get Dr. Im when I got there. Most people’s suggestions were to get it taken looked at immediately, so I got the earliest appointment which was 2 days later.
It’s great to have a flexible work schedule, cause I just left work at 2pm and came back at 4pm.
Anyway, my last dentist visit was back in December. My parents have always been the ones setting up the visits for me. Haha. I don’t even go do a body checkup if my parents don’t nag me to go. However, my health has always been great, but my parents like to exaggerate things in front of doctor saying I had this, I’ve done that, making the doctor more nervous than me.
So I got in, filled out some forms, and waited for my turn. Was rather quick that I got seated. I got my round of questions and x-rays. They even had this panoramic x-ray thingy which I’ve never gone through before. Usually they just stick plastic in my mouth and shout beams of radiation into my face which is always scary. I wonder if there’s anyone who’s study for cancer/mutations in one’s face due to dental x-rays. I did noticed that the x-ray film placards they used were significantly fewer than the other dentists I’ve been to. They were also nicer on the gum as I recall 4 or 6 of those x-ray film placards previously gave me excruciating pain.
The dentist finally shows up and says from the x-rays my teeth look great. I mentioned about the hole in one of my tooth and he says that could very well be the case, since the x-rays only provide a 2D view of my teeth. He had on a pair of these funky glasses which had extended magnify glasses for each lens and starts checking each tooth. He finds the teeth with the hole and starts scraping out some food gunk. I had wanted to not each before I came, but I was too hungry, so a couple cookies had to be eaten.
He tells me that my original filling had fallen loose and now food and bacteria fill the hole. He says he’ll remove the original filling, clean it out, and fill it. He mentions that all my current fillings are metallic and the only fillings they use here are the white resin-composite. He prefaces his suggestions with that he doesn’t recommend his patients to redo their metal fillings, especially the ones in the back since they are hardly noticeable, but if I really wanted to, he would do it. I mention the fact that the current fillings have mercury and if that would be a problem. He goes mercury is only dangerous in vapor and liquid form. As a solid in the filling, it should have no harmful effects. I didn’t get a chance to ask him what if I swallowed the filling that had broken off, as that might’ve been what had happened.
RayAlome had mentioned there might be a chance that I’ll be getting a crown since the hole had already broken the outer surface, but it didn’t seem to be the case. After cleaning out the bacteria, they clamped my tooth down with a metallic ring and started inserting the filling and using what I thought was a heat gun, but RayAlome says it was most likely a UV-ray gun to solidify the resin-composite filling. Next he took what I can only describe as dental sander and sanded down the filling until it matched the shape of a regular tooth. Initially after the dental visit, the underside of that tooth was rather rough, but due to my chewing and eating and constant tongue flicking, it has not completely smoothen out
Afterwards, they did the normal cleaning (spinning toothbrush) and then went on to this drill like cleaning thing. That thing hurt… BIG time, even though Dr. Im claimed it would not hurt at all and was a new “advance” technique for cleaning teeth. Finally I got my fluoride treatment, supposedly to make my teeth whiter, and wasn’t allowed to drink or eat anything in the next 30 minutes.
Dr. Im said my teeth were in excellent condition and besides the fallen filling, there was no new cavities or anything wrong. He did mention that the tooth with the new filling may be sore for a week or two, but that is normal. I can finally eat candy and cookies and ice cream without the pain!
Since “someone” doesn’t like to have gross pictures posted directly on my blog, you can see my new tooth here: picture. The new filling is the white one stuck between the 2 teeth with metal filling.
Dr. Im forgot to mention to me last time I visited that the filling he replaced would be sore for a couple of weeks, because it was. D: But then, I already have cold sensitive teeth in general.
IIRC, that “drill-like cleaning thing” was actually a high-frequency sonic tool with a water spray to keep it from overheating. I actually found it to be quite pleasant, and my gums aren’t exactly in great shape. Did he mention anything about your gums being super irritated after he did the cleaning?
Oh yah, that’s what he call it: high frequency sonic thingy. He didn’t mention anything about my gums being sensitive and since the pain was somewhat bearable, I didn’t say anything.