Many people flinch when their dentist tells them they need root canal therapy.  While dentists are sympathetic to fears of pain, at Dr. Mashhood’s office we want your root canal experience to be as painless as possible.  Dr. Mashhood uses the best local anesthetics, nitrous oxide and can even use sedation to help you get through the root canal procedure painlessly.

Our purpose for providing root canal therapy is to achieve the following:

	Stop the toothache
	Prevent the bacterial infection from spreading into the jaw and throughout your body
	Maintain the original tooth instead of removing it and replacing it with a fixed bridge or a removable partial denture.

A tooth’s root canal is actually a channel that runs through the root of the tooth from the end of the root up to the pulp chamber in the center of the upper part of the tooth which we see.  The canal contains blood vessels, nerves and complex cells that make up the living tissues inside the tooth.  Teeth in the front of the mouth have 1 or 2 canals.  Teeth in the back of the mouth have 2, 3, or 4 canals.

When a tooth receives a hard blow or when germs (bacteria) come in contact with the pulp in the pulp chamber from a cavity or a crack in the tooth or the root canals, the soft pulp tissues become inflamed.  The pressure from the resulting inflammation causes pain (sometimes severe) and swelling.  The pulp will then die causing pain during this process.  There are three causes of root canal disease:

	Deep tooth cavities for root canal disease
	A blow to the tooth
	Gum disease in which the germs destroy the bone around the end of the root.

Root canal disease is a threat to your health because it brings down your immune system.   Also the invading bacteria travels from the tooth by way of the circulatory system to the body’s vital organs and can contribute to many systemic diseases including heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, ulcers, and pre-term babies in young women to mention a few.

Root canal therapy removes the source of the infection, relieves the pain, and saves the tooth. 

If you have a dental emergency or for more information about how Dr. Mashhood can help you with your tooth pain, call us at (310) 289-1101. We will be happy to  help you or  to talk with you.