I don’t know about you, but I suffer from wisdom tooth pain ALL THE TIME. Sometimes I only have to think about a sore wisdom tooth and its happening. Luckily for you I have compiled my years of experience into this troubleshooting blog post so you don’t have to suffer, at least not for long anyway.

Wisdom teeth usually come in between the ages of 16 and 24. Now this is a pretty big window, and its not exactly hard and fast. We’ve got 4 wisdom teeth, 2 on the top and two on the bottom. Now the top ones usually come in with little or no trouble, the bottom ones are a different story. Lower wisdom teeth will either

be very well behaved and come straight up like daisies, both sides, ah perfection
be impacted pushing into the molar tooth in front which can ultimately cause a cavity
come up tongue side first and then cheek side - not a total disaster as it will usually end up like bullet point 1, but can be problematic as it comes through
come up cheek side first and then tongue side - these are the really difficult ones because the whole tongue side thing, doesn’t always happen. This my friends, is the exact situation that I’m in.

When a wisdom tooth doesn’t come up all the way we refer to it as partially erupted. Partially erupted wisdom teeth are, plaque magnets, food traps and hard to clean. My secret formula for wisdom tooth pain is a two pronged approach, prevention, and cure and I’ll let you in on it now.

Keep your wisdom tooth clean.

You should take special care at cleaning this area everyday as part of your daily routine. Single tufted brushes are amazing for cleaning around wisdom teeth, especially if they are partially erupted. Something like a Curaprox 1009 Ortho brush * is great for this, but any single tufted brush will be great as long as your technique is right. Use your finger to steady the brush as you are using it, work the brush round in small circles until the area is clean, you don’t need to use toothpaste, the brush itself is more than enough, oh and you should replace these brushes every 3 months or so. You can found out a little more about single tufted brushes here.

For me I use a combination of a single tufted brush and my Waterpik Cordless Advanced water flosser. I find I can get some food trapping because my wisdom tooth has something called an operculum sitting over the top of the tooth, basically its a bit if extra gum. If I don’t keep this area clean, or if I eat too much sugar, party too much, get stressed or unwell this area swells up and then I’m in trouble. The water flosser flushes under the gum, kind of like a mini hygienist clean, if I do this everyday, I tend to have less problems. You can find out more about waterflossers here.

When you are brushing, you should use a toothbrush with the smallest head you possibly can. An electric toothbrush like the Oral B Genius 9000 * is great, or the Curaprox 5460 manual toothbrush * is also good. If you don’t have or can’t get either of these any brush with a small head is perfect, the smaller the better.

Think about nutrition.

If you’re not looking after your diet, one of the first places you’ll see this is in your mouth. You need to make sure you’re getting 40mg of Vitamin C every single day. You can find out a little more about Vitamin C and gum health here. The best way to get Vitamin C is by eating a wide variety of fresh fruit and vegetables but if you can’t do this you could try a Vitamin C supplement, I like vitamin supplements by Altrient, but any Vitamin C supplement should be fine.

In addition to what you SHOULD be eating, its also worth thinking about what you should be cutting back on. Sugar, especially eating a lot of sugar, causes gum inflammation. My wisdom tooth usually flares up, conveniently, when I’m off on my Christmas holidays my theory on this is because I’m 100% eating a lot more sugar than I usually would around this time.

Think about your lifestyle.

If you’re feeling stressed, or if you’ve been on a crazy party holiday, or you’ve overcommitted to everything and been as my mother would say, ‘burning the candle at both ends’ your wisdom tooth will probably let you know about it. It might swell up, bleed, become tender. You kind of have to let it have its moment, keep it as clean as possible when all this is happening and possibly treat it with something antibacterial which we’ll get to in a minute. In an ideal world a way to resolve this is to party less, don’t spread yourself too thin, be less stressed..but this isn’t always possible. Just be mindful that actions will cause reactions and give your wisdom tooth a bit of an airbag by trying to get as many nutrients into you as possible, sleeping as much as you can, and keeping the sucker clean.

Be aware of what you’re eating.

Now, I’m not saying you should avoid these food, in fact some of them are very healthy, but in my personal experience and with patients that I see at the dental clinic these usual suspects often cause problems so being aware and giving your wisdom tooth a flush after you’ve eaten them usually isn’t a bad idea.

Seeds
Fruits with very small seeds like raspberries
Oranges
Nuts
Popcorn
Some fibrous foods like meats - I’ve once cleaned basically an entire roast dinner out of someones wisdom tooth. Can’t even.

If you follow these rules this should help prevent your wisdom tooth getting angry, inflamed and sore. But this can still happen from time to time if we neglect the above so what do we do when your quiet, calm little wisdom tooth turns into the miniature version of the hulk? Well you should..

Step 1 - Treat that angry wisdom tooth at home.

Even though you probably don’t want to, even though it might bring tears to your eyes, once a wisdom tooth is inflammed, and angry, and shouting at you, you need to do something about it. I usually recommend a combination of:

1) Cleaning as much and as thoroughly as you can preferably with a single tufted brush.

2) Some sort of antibacterial mouthwash like Corsodyl treatment mouthwash * or Curaprox Perio Plus + mouthwash *, they also both have gel version of this is also very good, better infact, and has been my saviour manys a time. Be careful though with these as they both contain chlorhexidine so you need to watch especially if it is your first time using the product as you may have an allergy, if this is the case see below. They can also cause staining and should only be used for a maximum of 2 weeks.

3) Rinsing with warm salty water. Three times in a row, three times a day, for three days.

9 times out of 10 this will work. If this doesn’t give you any relief, you have a swelling, temperature and find it difficult to open you should contact your dental practice immediately if this isn’t an option you should use an out of hours dental service.

Get that angry wisdom tooth treated at your dental practice.

Sometimes, despite our best efforts, we all need a little bit of help. WE ARE MORE THAN HAPPY TO OFFER THIS TO YOU. Sometimes I’ve had patients who didn’t want to be a bother, or thought it would go away on its own, we’re here to help you, we love helping :) always contact your practice.

Usually a good thorough clean with your Hygienist will help flush the gum around the tooth an evict any unwanted food traps. Generally we can do this better because we can directly see the area, we have a massive light to see the area better and we have the right tools for the job. This can be uncomfortable, even painful but we can relieve the area a bit either with topical numbing gel or a local anaesthetic. This works the best if we can get the tooth sorted out at a fairly early stage.

SOMETIMES, and only sometimes, usually if there is swelling, limited opening and possible temperature, the Dentist may have to be called in to prescribe an antibiotic for you. In some cases these can cause an upset stomach so you need to be careful if you are using oral contraceptives during this time.

If this happens to you often the tooth may be extracted, sometimes this may have to be done be a specialist so you may need to be referred. Generally no biggie and if you suitable you can be sedated if you want to, not all teeth are suitable though so this decision is usually down to your Dentist. In America pretty much all wisdom teeth are extracted, my friend lives there and they think she’s mad for holding on to hers (hi Ashley :)). Extractions definitely won’t happen on the day you turn up to the dental surgery in pain, so don’t panic. Even after all my heartache and a filling I still don’t have mine extracted hmmmmmm.

So hopefully fellow long suffering wisdom tooth patient this was helpful. Remember please contact your dental practice with any queries or if you are suffering from wisdom tooth pain and if this is not possible please contact your nearest out of hours service especially if you have