Wisdom teeth pulling unecessary in teens w/o wisdom teeth?!
Question:
Wisdom teeth pulling unecessary in teens w/o wisdom teeth?
My friend's teen sons both had their wisdom teeth pulled & they were very far embedded, not even close to breaking through.
Now, my son's dentist says the same recomendation: Pull them before they are a problem?
WHY!?! I am not uncessarily putting my son under for this.
Is it because they think they won't be covered by insurance later & it is a crock to make money?
Please give your comments, advice that you KNOW.
Don't pull it out your...err... well, you know where from!...
Please any experiences for good or bad... thanks!
Answers:
Hi,
I'm a dental assistant. You have several options and most of it is purely your or your son's preference.
Option 1--Pull the teeth now and you don't have to worry about any problems in the future. The third molar is usually difficult to clean behind or around. If your sons are not one for flossing or brushing twice a day, then you could be looking at avoiding some sort of decay in the future. If they start to have decay, then you're talking about buying antibiotics or pain medication for the infection and then paying for the extractions.
Option 2--You can wait and see how their teeth will come out. Did your dentist take a panaramic x-ray of your sons? If so then he could have possibly seen that they will come in at a difficult angle or that them coming in would cause problems such as crowding or even being impacted either bony or tissue.
Option 3--You can wait until your sons are adults and let them make the decision, however, unless they are in college, they won't be covered under your insurance.
In my opinion, it's no reason to have them and it's very rare that the wisdom teeth come in JUST RIGHT. I had all of mine extracted and they weren't giving me a problem but I was able to see on the x-ray that down the line, I would run into some problems. The only downfall of having the extraction is that occassionally some food will become stuck behind the second molar but it's nothing that a simple finger won't remove and with my wisdom teeth gone, I can floss much better behind my 2nd molar. I hope this helps.