Healthy Smile: How Many Times Can You Do A Root Canal?

by Jeffrey Gross, DDS, FAGD of The Healthy Smile

Oddly enough, this question was posed when I went to an eyeglass store to purchase new frames for my glasses. The sales associate discovered I was a dentist, and we started to chit-chat while looking at frames. She told me that she had an appointment with a new dentist as her former dentist stopped seeing patients. The crown on her root canal was loose, and she thought she would need a new root canal to strengthen the tooth and crown.

Those thoughts led to her question about the possibility of repeating root canal therapy on her tooth to help strengthen and stabilize her tooth. Let’s discuss the what and why of her situation. As I sat across from her at the optometry store, my eyes went to her smile. She only had front teeth as a good portion of the back upper teeth were gone. The anchor tooth on the upper right side, her “eye” tooth” or cuspid, was noticeably missing.

The lack of back teeth resulted in all of her chewing occurring on her front teeth, which we have discussed in previous columns. Front teeth are not meant to bear the heavy load of chewing, and bad things can happen when a person eats in that fashion. In her case, all of her front teeth were untouched by any dental work except for this crown over a root canal-treated tooth. The excess stress of front tooth chewing caused a loosening of the crown or possibly a root fracture.

Remember, I was not in my office, so I did not have any x-rays to confirm or disprove my suspicions, but her description of the problem is one that I see often. Retreating, the technical term for doing a second root canal on a tooth, will not solve her problem. That last statement implies that I can do more than one root canal treatment on a tooth which is true. Dentists do that when the problem is a failing root canal treatment, as in the return of an infection at the tip of the root. A loose crown is not fixed by redoing root canal therapy.

The frequency of retreatment was more common years ago as it was the last resort before we removed a tooth. Retreats on front teeth were very popular. Today, the advent and predictability of implant dentistry to correct the area of the mouth that has a missing tooth make repeating a root canal less common.

If the chance of success is good with repeating a root canal, then it is an easier and faster choice than removing a tooth and placing an implant. Retreating a root canal is usually done in one visit, and its ease makes the procedure less costly than other alternative approaches. If you find that you have a tooth that you saved years ago with root canal therapy and start to feel that something is not right, please give us a call at 440-892-1810 and we will help you get into the schedule as efficiently as possible. I look forward to hearing from you.

Jeffrey Gross, DDS, FAGD is an Ohio licensed general dentist and is on the staff of Case Western Reserve School of Dental Medicine.

The Healthy Smile • 27239 Wolf Road, Bay Village, OH 44140 • 440-892-1810 • www.jeffreygrossdds.com