Wisdom Tooth Extractions – Waverly, IA
Keeping Your Smile Strong and Healthy
Ordinarily, Dr. Smiley and his team work hard to help patients keep their teeth healthy and beautiful for a lifetime. However, there are exceptions to that rule. Sometimes the best choice is extraction in order to preserve your oral health. One common example is wisdom tooth extraction. These large teeth, whether erupted or impacted, can be a threat to other teeth as well as your overall oral health. Therefore, Dr. Smiley usually recommends wisdom tooth extractions in Waverly, IA in order to preserve your healthy and beautiful smile.
Why Choose Smiley Family Dentistry for Wisdom Tooth Extractions?
- Experienced and Highly Trained Dentist
- Compassionate, Caring Dental Team
- Patients of All Ages Welcome
Why Do I Have Wisdom Teeth?
Good question! After all, if most people have their wisdom teeth extracted, then what are they doing in your mouth in the first place? A long, long time ago, our prehistoric ancestors needed these large teeth to chew their diets of roughage and tough meats. As the human diet changed and cooked foods became part of daily meals, these teeth became obsolete. However, we still have them as vestiges of our prehistoric past.
Reason for Wisdom Tooth Extraction in Waverly
The number one reason for wisdom tooth extraction is their size. The human mouth is simply not as big as it was millennia ago, so most people don’t have room for these large teeth. As a consequence, wisdom teeth can press on adjacent teeth, causing pain. And if you or your child has recently had orthodontic treatment, then extracting these teeth becomes all the more important in order to avoid problems with alignment.
Other reasons for wisdom teeth extraction include:
- The threat of infection, tooth decay, and gum disease increase with both impacted wisdom teeth as well as erupted wisdom teeth that are difficult to clean.
- Cysts can develop around impacted wisdom teeth, leading to bone damage.
Wisdom Tooth Extraction Step-by-Step
Dr. Smiley will handle the entire process of extracting your wisdom professionally and gently. After anesthetizing the area around each wisdom tooth, he makes an incision in your gum tissue and removes some bone in order to expose the tooth. In some cases, a wisdom tooth can be extracted with forceps. Other times, the tooth is too large, and the tooth must be cut and removed in sections. After removing each wisdom tooth, Waverly dentist Dr. Smiley will suture the site.
Recovery from Wisdom Tooth Extraction
After your surgery, you can expect some bleeding and swelling to occur. Use a clean gauze pad to slow the bleeding. Ice packs applied to your cheeks—20 minutes on and 20 minutes off—will help to reduce swelling.
Stay well hydrated during recovery, but do not use a straw to drink. Stick to a diet of soft foods for the first few days. Smoothies, applesauce, soups, pudding, soft pasta, and pureed vegetables are ideal.
Finally, get plenty of rest. Following these recovery instructions will reduce your healing time and help you avoid complications.