Temporary Crowns:
After your tooth has been prepared for a crown you will have a temporary crown placed to aid in comfort, protect the tooth, and help prevent the surrounding teeth from shifting. Temporary crowns are not strong, and may break or come off. If your temporary does come off, please replace immediately with a temporary cement, denture adhesive, or Vaseline. Vaseline may help hold a temporary in place, but please remove the temporary when you eat and sleep to prevent swallowing or inhaling and call the office ASAP so we may recement it for you.
To help prevent your temporary from coming off, please avoid the following:
Sticky foods, i.e.: gum, caramels, taffy, ect.
Bread products, i.e.: sandwiches, pizza, bagels, brownies, rolls, biscuits, ect
Hard foods, i.e.: hard candies, ice, tough meats, ect
Please continue to floss daily around your temporary crown to allow the gums to stay healthy, or in the event of a gingivectomy, aid in the healing process. When flossing, please pull the floss through the side to prevent dislodging the temporary.
What is normal to feel after crown preparation?
It is very normal to feel temperature, chewing, and gum sensitivity after having any type of dental treatment. If this sensitivity lasts longer than 30 seconds after eating or drinking, if it aches, or throbs without stimulation, or you have swelling in the area please call the office for an evaluation.
Sometimes a person will have substantial discomfort that they didn’t have prior to dental treatment. In many cases this is reversible with time, but when it is irreversible you may need further treatment such as root canal therapy. A priority for us is to avoid canal therapy so you won’t have additional expense, time in the chair, and discomfort from infection. No one can tell you decisively if your tooth needs root canal therapy prior to treatment, because the bacteria that enters the nerve chamber is microscopic. If a tooth has decay, it’s broken, or has a filling or crown that is leaking, the infection from the bacteria can leak out and usually you won’t have discomfort. This does not mean the tooth didn’t have an infection prior to treatment. Dental treatment saves the tooth by removing the diseased part of the tooth, and restoring it back to a healthy function. If the tooth has an infection caused by this microscopic bacteria, the gases and liquids that are created by the infection are now trapped inside your restored tooth, and can cause pressure build up which causes pain. No one knows when and if this will happen. You are almost always the first one to know if you need canal therapy by your symptoms. If you have any questions or concerns please do not hesitate to call the office.
