My brother is having pain in his back teeth what should he do?

Could be anything. I’m surprised that a dental clinic would give him such wildly different possibilities, that make no sense what so ever. Is he young (late teens)? Could be wisdom teeth erupting. He really needs to get X-rays of the areas of concern and go to a normal ! clinic and be examined. There’s just not enough information to hazard a guess of what could be going on. Good luck to you I hope his pain isn’t severe.

Here is a wild thought that just came to me, he could go see a dentist, since they deal with that sort of thing.

@trailsillustrated He turned 21 couple months ago. Already had his wisdom teeth removed.
@Hypocrisy_Central Here is a wild thought. Read the details.

We just came from the endodonist, they re did x-rays and evaluation. He was told that there is nothing wrong with his teeth from what they seen.

Either this is some kind of way to milk money from us paying for visits, worst dentists and/or luck ever – I hate saying that but….I don’t even know anymore.

My only guesses are he just has sensitive teeth in that area for whatever reason or he does indeed grind his teeth enough to cause pain/discomfort.

I told him to get the tooth ache relief cream they have at stores to least do something for it.

This is a guess, but I would bet he is clenching or grinding his teeth. Would he be willing to go to a dentist and ask for a night guard?

Keep in mind that I am not a dentist, so don’t just take my word for it!

@tedibear Yea I told my brother same thing, but he insists that he does not. I am guessing he probably wouldn’t know if he did or not.

If he is doing it in his sleep, he probably doesn’t know. It can’t hurt him to try, and it may even help. Give him a gentle thwap upside the head and tell him I said he should at least try. :P

What type of pain? Sensitivity? Soreness? More pain in the morning? Nerve pain? Are you sure he had all four wisdom teeth pulled?

Did the pain only recently start up?

It’s lower teeth right?

Has he had work done in that area? My daughter had a similar problem. The first time she went to a chain dentist company. They did a terrible job, and had her coming back again and again for weeks until we finally stepped in and told her she needed to go to a “real” dentist, and gave her the money to pay the new guys to fix what the bad dentist did. The new folks said she needed a root canal because of the constant irritation to that tooth by the previous dentist.

Most expensive “just a filling” ever!

< is a dentist. Have him try sensodyne for a bit. He could be brushing that area too hard – he is a guy and they tend to do this- and worn some of the gum away a little bit and have some root exposure. He may have some minor gum infection back there- that can really make them ache happened to me! If he has bleeding back there when he brushes he needs to clear that up. Did they do a bite check? ( blue paper that you bite on). It’s possible that one or other of the teeth is too high can make it sore. These are the only things I can think of given that he’s been examined and no findings. If he were grinding, he would most likely have a headache also and some soreness in the TMJ joint. Let us know what happens.

I will attempt to convince to get a night guard, see if it improves anything.

He did have work done in the area. Went to the clinic first which did 1 filling. That seemed to make things worse, at which point I did advise him to a “real” dentist which he got Humana dental insurance and 4 different visits later this where he is at.

He is still complaining that the tooth in the back I believe it was tooth 19? The number system the dentist use. But it seems to all be in lower and upper right towards back of the mouth when I asked him.

I’ve been asking him everyday if its better and now its to the point where he has to take some kind pain medicine Advil or the like. Said he doesn’t wanna use the oral creme unless it is extreme pain. He describes the pain as a dull ache or sometimes a throbbing that increases at times.

Asked about the brushing too hard thing, he says he does not as he is aware it can cause damage/bleeding.

He seems to feel it is an infection, but wouldn’t by now he would know? This has been going on for months apparently surely infection would take over to the point of an ER visit?

I had cellulitis , infection on my foot (blood blister from rucking) and once it got into my blood stream I felt it. I was basically very ill, chills and what not. Is it the same for mouth/teeth?

And yes he did do a bite test, they said it was normal.

PS, What the “TMJ” joint?

I would see a prothodontist at this point. I had a bad bond repair and three dentist told me I could bit just fine, when for the first time my bite was so off it was ridiculous. I had never in my life had a bite or grinding problem. I had to put my tongue between teeth to give my jaw a rest and relieve the headaches. My prosthodontist saw right away the problem with my bite when he had me bit down on that paper that leaves marks. His paper was much bigger than what the dentists were using. He still did not get me 100%, because it had been a couple of years already and my teeth had shifted so much. That dentist who fucked up my bond (it was a repair, I have had a bond since 6th grade, never a problem, including one repair before this one) had accomplished fucking up my orthodonture work I had done as a teenager. Pretty upsetting. One visit to the prothodontst and I was 85% better. It was drastic relief right away. My teeth continue to shift back again. I won’t bore you with the whole story.

A prosthodontist can evaluate if he has an infection like a dentist can.

Dull ache and throbbing I’m sorry to say sounds like he needs a root canal. He needs a cold /hot test on the teeth in question. The nerve is dying. He’s had a bite eval, it’s a leaky filling or the nerve is giving up. He needs to see an endodontist although any dentist can do the hot/cold test. If his bite is normal, there’s no reason to see a prosthodontist, who are trained to fit bites usually in dentures only. If there’s is no lesion radiographically the nerve can still be dying. Thus the reason for hot/cold test. The TMJ is the jaw joint, but from what you said it doesn’t sound like that. It’s in #18 or 19 and it’s probably going to be a root canal sorry

@trailsillustrated I have great confidence in your dentistry skills as you know, so I’d be willing to bet money you’re correct, but how can it be that the dentists he has seen thus far haven’t diagnosed it as a root problem? That seems fairly straight forward to diagnose.

If his insurance is having him go to a large hmo type clinic, they replaced a filling he says. A reasonable first step. A LOT things can be missed in this type clinic, I forgot to tell him to have his bro hold an IceCube on 18 and 19 and see what happens. Sometimes, if they don’t see anything on the X-ray they will conclude nothing’s wrong. Maybe they didn’t have time. I’ve told you before some of the things people miss that I’ve seen. Root canal problems are not always straight forward, unless there’s a big lesion at the root tip they’re not. The first step is to replace the filling.

Also, the tooth could be cracked into the root, which can be difficult to diagnose. Then his options would be extraction or a crown.

Just quick update. My brother got a custom made mouth guard (which wasn’t cheap even with insurance) But least any adjustments and future re makes if needed are free.

At this point the only real thing left was the grinding teeth /clenching jaw possibility. Apparently they thought he might have needed a new filling to replace one he already had as its made of silver? Some other name the dentist called it. Something about some dentist do not prefer the silver filling compared to the gold? Anyways….Lets just hope this is it.

Told after about a week of using it, and that is the problem he would notice a change if not dramatic change.

Amalgam is the silver kind. I hope they replaced it with gold, it’s the best.