I have crowns coming out my ears but have never had a root canal. I just learned this morning I need two. I will be doing them a month apart. Is this something where I should plan to take the whole day off of work or is it common to go to work the same day?
IMO, you can go to work the same day. You might be a little sore but they will give you painkillers for that. IME, I’ve only needed ibuprophen.
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You’ll be fine. I’ve had a bunch and while it’s not something I’d look forward to it’s not as bad as it’s made out to be. You’ll be fine right after.
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My experience was that it’s not a five minute thing, and by the time I was done, while not in pain (no Rx drug required, just Advil) I was exhausted and just wanted to be quiet and relax.
I’d take the day to yourself.
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ok. i have had 5 or 6 of them.
Huge hint: Take a pair of padded earphones (or airpods - whatever) and turn on a funny podcast or great music while they are drilling. It makes a huge difference. My dentist said he liked hearing me laugh while he was drilling.
I do take care of my teeth as much as anyone – my brother (not bio) has had no cavities let alone root canals. We grew up in the same household; so its not environment - but heredity to me!
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Yes! I neglected to mention that I bring noise canceling headphones and play music - I don’t want to see or hear -
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Some dentists offer sedation in addition to a local anesthetic shot. I personally prefer as few drugs as possible in my body, so I politely decline these offers (typically not covered by insurance, so pure money making for dentists). If you decide to go with the sedation, you might need a driver to bring you home and to take a day off work.
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I had one few a years ago. It really was not all that bad (in my case). The tooth has been fine since.
However, I had it in the mid afternoon, and had no inclination to go to work later that day. I am however pretty sure that I drove myself home after the root canal, which suggests that no opioids and no sedation were involved (at least not until the Novocaine wore off). I think that I might have taken one single opioid that evening to help me sleep, and otherwise just went with ibuprofen.
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I just had my first last week. It wasn’t too bad - in terms of length of the procedure I’d say it’s similar to a crown. Discomfort was actually less for me than getting a crown. With a crown it’s always uncomfortable once they start with the flossing and fitting and cleaning up under the gumline.
After the procedure there was no pain, maybe a tiny bit of occasional discomfort probably from swelling the next day, but like a 1 out of 10 in terms of pain, very minor and no problems eating. Whereas crowns tend to take me 2-3 months to fully settle down, the root canal was fine the same day.
Both procedures were kind of exhausting though. If it’s easy to take the day off then you’ll appreciate it. But if you need to get back to work you’ll be fine, other than the numbness lasting for 4-5 hours which might affect your speech.
If you can plan the time of the appointment, try for either first appointment of the day or just after lunch. You will be numb for several hours after the procedure and will want to avoid eating or drinking until some of the numbness wears off. You can speed up the process with warm drinks at that point, but be sure the liquid is not hot enough to scald your mouth.
Unless you opt for sedation you will be fine to drive. Cognition will not be impaired, Whether or not you can return to work depends on what you do and how easily embarrassed you are. Your speech will be slurred. You may drool. If you attempt to eat or drink, you run the risk of spilling it down your front. You may have pain at injection sites but the tooth itself should not hurt.
If you opt for sedation, expect 1-2 days to recover from the sedative.
The most painful part is when they run your credit card through the machine on your way out. 
I have always gone about my day, but your mouth will be sensitive for a bit.
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My last one took forever as in about three hours. I’m not at all apprehensive about dental care, but it wasn’t a great experience. As I remember, the endo took forever just trying to locate my fourth root?? Then finally took an X-ray to locate it, but it took way too long for him to admit defeat. I was exhausted afterwards. The whole experience took several months bc the tooth kept getting infected. I ended up getting the tooth extracted.
I guess I’ve had another one that needed extraction after a couple of years also. Maybe I just have fragile teeth. Although the endos have always cautioned that a root canal may not be effective.
I’ve also had a failed implant after a failed root canal, and am getting an implant next week bc of tooth decay under a crown (didn’t go to the dentist for a couple of years during Covid).
But the procedure isn’t painful at all, it’s just like getting a filling, just longer.
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My root canal was the worst experience. I’m glad everyone here seems to have had good experiences.
I had many, many root canals (as in, how many roots are there anyway?) and if available, so-called laughing gas is strongly recommended–lasts only as long as the mask is covering your nose. Possibly even better, as recommended above, your favorite music, preferably coming to you using noise-canceling earphones.
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I have had a very wide range in terms of how long it took for a crown to “settle down”. One stopped hurting after 2 days. Another was still bothering me after a year. I asked my dentist and he asked: “Has it improved at all”. I said “yes”. He said “let’s wait another year and see how it goes”. After two years it was fine. My dentist told me that was pretty much the range in terms of how long it takes for a crown to stop being sensitive. I had the same dentist for all of my crowns, and the rest have indeed been somewhere in the middle of the “2 days to 2 years” range before they were no longer sensitive (mostly towards the shorter end of this range).
I would expect that root canals similarly have a range of outcomes, but I have only had one so I have not gotten to experience this.
I had one implant, and it was less pleasant than the root canal (particularly from the “credit card pain” point of view).
At this point growing old is still better than the alternative.
You are going to be numb and possibly drooling. If your job needs a lot of face to face contact or talking I might take the day off. You won’t need drugs so won’t be impaired but definitely be uncomfortable
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Thanks so much everybody. My work involves a lot of talking face to face so maybe I will just take those days off.
If anybody still has stories about their root canal experiences keep them coming.
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I’m glad I had a good experience because I’m the biggest baby when it comes to teeth. The biggest baby. Oh how I cried when I heard I needed a root canal. My parents have terrible teeth and I have many images from my childhood of my mom in couch all day in pain after root canals and procedures.
My experience? Completely the opposite (obviously mostly in part due to better procedures 30 years later). I thought it was far better than the crown with the grinding and the smell. I also loved my surgeon who explained to me step by step what he was going to do and had a little picture book that looked like it was for kids. I can’t STAND looking at anything tooth related, so animated pictures were awesome for me. It also helped that he kept remarking that otherwise my tooth was in great shape. I had great roots or something. I have this huge irrational fear of a tooth flying out at the dentist anytime they’re flossing or cleaning, so now I keep this in mind while I grip the chair white knuckled.
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What I was told is that if the tooth is not in pain before the root canal, it will not be a painful process. I can attest that at least in my case, for 2 root canals it was true.
OTOH, if you need a root canal because there is pain, the procedure will include some pain–what I’ve been told, YMMV.
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Local anesthesia during the procedure prevents any pain, except for the anesthesia injection, then afterwards, you should have little pain bc all the nerves in the root will have been removed. Thats been my experience, and both of my root canal teeth were painful. I think maybe my jaw was sore from my last one from holding my mouth open for so long.
Now, an extraction and implant can be painful afterwards.
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