Tooth Extraction in Jasper, AL

Sometimes, a tooth simply cannot be saved. Whether it’s because of severe damage, infection, or overcrowding, tooth extraction may be the healthiest option to protect your oral health. While the thought of having a tooth removed can understandably cause some concern, it’s important to know you’re in excellent hands at Bivona Family Dentistry. Our experienced team uses modern techniques and gentle care to ensure the process is as quick and comfortable as possible. With today’s advancements, tooth extractions have become a routine procedure that prioritizes your comfort and leaves you feeling confident about your smile’s future.

Signs You May Need a Tooth Extraction

When we can’t save your tooth, removing it is often the best way to protect your oral health. Extracting the tooth can prevent further damage or prevent an infection from spreading. Here are a few common reasons why we might recommend a tooth extraction:

• Dental trauma or injury: Minor tooth damage, like a small chip, can often be repaired with a dental crown or bonding. However, teeth with extensive fractures, cracks, or root damage may need to be pulled.
• Severe decay: If your tooth’s inner pulp becomes infected from a crack or an untreated cavity and a root canal isn’t enough to save it, we’ll need to extract the tooth. This step is necessary to prevent the infection from spreading.
• Overcrowding: When teeth don’t have enough room to grow properly, or if a patient has hyperdontia (extra teeth), tooth extraction may be necessary to prevent discomfort or misalignment.
• Advanced periodontal disease: If gum disease progresses into the more advanced stages, it can significantly deteriorate the bone and tissue that holds your teeth in place. When periodontal treatment isn’t enough to stop the damage, removing the affected tooth may be necessary to protect your overall oral health.
• Impaction: An impacted tooth does not fully emerge from the gums, which can cause ongoing pain or harm nearby teeth.
• Wisdom teeth problems: Many people don’t have adequate space in their jaws for wisdom teeth to emerge properly. They’re often removed because of issues like impaction, infection, or the potential to crowd and misalign other teeth. Left untreated, these problems can lead to pain, swelling, and damage to surrounding teeth.

Tooth Extraction Procedures

Simple Extraction

A simple extraction is a straightforward procedure that we perform when a tooth is visible and easily accessible.

The process begins with a local anesthetic to numb the area, ensuring you remain comfortable throughout the procedure. Using specialized dental instruments, we will gently loosen the tooth and remove it from its socket.

Once we remove the tooth, we will clean and disinfect the area. We will then place a gauze pad to promote clotting or use stitches if needed to aid healing. While most patients can resume their normal activities within a day or two, full healing of the jawbone may take several weeks.

Surgical Extraction

A surgical extraction may be required when a tooth is not visible, is fractured at or below the gum line, or has complex features that make a simple extraction more difficult. Although the procedure is more intricate, it’s one of the most common surgeries in the U.S., making it a well-practiced and reliable treatment.

To enhance your comfort and ensure a stress-free visit, we can combine a local anesthetic with sedation. At Bivona Family Dentistry, we offer nitrous oxide (laughing gas) and oral conscious sedation to help patients feel at ease.

Once you’re comfortable, we’ll make a small incision in your gums to access the tooth. If we can’t easily extract it, we may have to break it into smaller pieces. We’ll clean the area once the tooth is out and stitch the gum closed.

The recovery time for a surgical extraction will be slightly longer, and you may feel more soreness afterward. We’ll provide detailed instructions on how to help the wound heal and may prescribe medication to help with pain and swelling.

L-PRF: Accelerating Your Recovery

Leukocyte-platelet rich fibrin (L-PRF) therapy is an innovative treatment that can support healing after dental extractions. L-PRF is created from a small sample of your own blood, which our phlebotomists process to concentrate platelets, white blood cells, and fibrin. We then place these natural healing components at the extraction site to promote faster tissue regeneration, reduce inflammation, and lower the risk of infection. This therapy is especially beneficial for patients undergoing extractions, as it encourages a quicker and smoother recovery. By using L-PRF, we enhance the body’s natural healing process, helping you recover more comfortably and effectively.

Your Tooth Replacement Options

After we extract a non-wisdom tooth, replacing it as soon as possible is crucial for maintaining your oral health. When a gap is left unfilled, the surrounding teeth can shift into the empty space, causing misalignment and issues with your bite. This change can complicate basic tasks like chewing and speaking and, over time, could lead to more severe dental problems. Additionally, gaps in your smile can collect bacteria, increasing the risk of decay and gum disease.

More importantly, without a tooth in place, the jawbone underneath doesn’t receive the necessary stimulation to stay healthy. This lack of stimulation leads to continual bone loss over time. Fortunately, replacing the tooth with a dental implant solves this problem. That’s because an implant replaces the tooth root, stimulating the jawbone to prevent bone loss.

Dental implants are small titanium posts that we insert directly into your jawbone. They provide a secure foundation for your tooth replacement, whether it’s a crown, bridge, or denture.

At Bivona Family Dentistry, we offer traditional and mini dental implants, both of which provide dependable support. However, mini dental implants might be the ideal choice after tooth extraction. These implants are about half the width of traditional ones and are just a single piece, allowing us to place them using an efficient and minimally invasive technique. In many cases, we like to extract a tooth and place it immediately with a mini dental implant. Doing so allows the socket and implant site to heal simultaneously, leading to quicker results. It’s also convenient, as it means you won’t have to undergo multiple oral surgeries to replace your tooth.

Contact Bivona Family Dentistry Today

Is a troublesome tooth causing you pain or discomfort? If so, we’re here to provide relief. At Bivona Family Dentistry, we prioritize your comfort and well-being, ensuring that your tooth extraction is as smooth and stress-free as possible. Our experienced team is dedicated to providing gentle care and personalized treatment. Contact us today to learn how we can restore your dental health and get you back to feeling your best.

Frequently Asked Questions