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For most people, getting a cavity filled does not hurt. Local anesthesia numbs the tooth before any drilling starts, so what you notice is pressure, vibration and cool air rather than pain. The injection is a short sting that passes in seconds. Mild soreness afterward is normal and usually fades within a few days. Below […]

Popping a gum abscess is unlikely to kill you by itself, but it can push a treatable infection into territory that does. Squeezing the pocket forces bacteria along soft tissue planes toward the jaw, the floor of the mouth, and the neck, and it leaves the real source of the infection sitting untouched. Fatal outcomes […]

You cannot get rid of a tooth abscess without going to the dentist, and no home remedy will cure one. An abscess is a sealed pocket of pus fed by an infected nerve or a deep gum pocket, so the infection keeps producing pus until a dentist removes the source. What you can do at […]

A healing normal socket after tooth extraction looks like a dark red blood clot in the first 24 hours, a whitish-gray film across the opening by days four to seven, and pink tissue closing inward by days seven to ten. That white film is what sends most patients searching at midnight, and it is almost […]

A swollen gum around one tooth in the back usually means the tissue around that single molar has become irritated or infected, most often from trapped food, plaque buildup, an early gum infection, a partly erupted wisdom tooth, or an abscess. The reason your gum is swollen around one tooth in the back matters because […]

If your teeth are yellow when you brush them every day, the brushing itself is rarely the problem. Daily brushing lifts plaque, but it cannot thicken your enamel, pull out stains that have already soaked in, or hide the naturally yellow dentin sitting underneath. Most yellow teeth come from a mix of surface stains, thinning […]

Whitening strips are not bad for your teeth when you use them exactly as directed, but they can cause real harm when you overuse them or apply them to teeth that were never good candidates. The peroxide gel that lifts stains can also reach past your enamel, and pushing past the recommended time or frequency […]