Tooth Implant & Taking Chances

One of my molars had to be extracted barely a year after it was metal-capped.

Last year, one corner of my molar broke off and I had no choice but to look for a private dentist to sort out the problem. Even though I have been having very regular dental checks by government-run dental clinic for the past four years, it is a fact that when come to emergency, government-run facilities are glaringly inadequate to provide instant professional assessment and advice (Read here).

This private dentist whom I knew since university days after looking at my broken tooth almost instantaneously recommended metal-capping to salvage it. I took his advice and the tooth had since worked perfectly well until a few weeks ago. There was this searing pain whenever I had cool water in my mouth, the most unbearable was when I drank icy drink.

In the recent visit, this same dentist after conducting some tests and X-ray concluded that the pain was mostly likely caused by a hairline crack in the tooth and it is no longer salvageable. His solution is to extract it and replace it with a tooth implant. The cost of one tooth implant is 10 times of metal-capping a tooth, a whooping price to pay!

When the dentist told me that the tooth could not be saved and had to be removed, there was this thought at the back of my mind whether he had made the right decision barely a year ago to cap it in the first place. Wouldn’t it be the right choice then that the tooth be removed and a tooth implant done there and then? But then mostly likely I would have objected because there was nothing to justify its removal. There was no pain then. I would have opted for metal-capping even if he said there would be a likelihood of a problem within a year or two. This is because of the thought of gain in taking chances. No sound mind would opt for paying 10 times when 1/10 of the cost may do the trick.

Sensing my hesitation, the dentist was quick to assure me with typical salesman talk: The cost spent on metal-capping is still worthwhile considering what the capped tooth had done for you for almost a year! With that, my metal-capped molar was removed and a new metal socket implanted. In another two months or so, no one can tell that I have lost a molar!

In the end, we still believe and take chances!