<p>Both of my kids had their wisdom teeth pulled (although I’m not sure whether it was truly justified in either instance). Their experiences were very different. My son had a lot of trouble with pain and swelling for almost a week afterward. My daughter had minimal discomfort.</p>
<p>Because my daughter has a history of asthma, they gave her steroid pills for several days before the oral surgery. My son did not get the steroids. We all wonder whether this accounts for her easier experience. (The alternative is that she’s less of a wimp when it comes to pain, which is entirely possible.) Anyway, you might want to ask about steroids during the pre-surgery visit to the oral surgeon.</p>
<p>A few more pieces of advice based on our experiences:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The oral surgeon is going to give your kid a prescription for a painkiller and probably an antibiotic as well. Your kid will still be stoned at the time when he/she is allowed to go home. You do not want to have to stop at the pharmacy and leave your stoned kid alone in the car or have to drag the stoned kid into the pharmacy with you while you wait for the medicines. Unless you have an extra person available who can do the pharmacy run for you, ask to get the prescriptions in advance and fill them before the day of the procedure. If the oral surgeon refuses to do that, at least try to get oral sugeon’s office to call in the prescriptions while your child is having the procedure so that the pharmacy can fill them before you get there. You might also want to speak to the pharmacist the day before to explain that you’re going to be alone with a patient who has just had oral surgery and would appreciate it if they could fill the prescriptions as quickly as possible.</p></li>
<li><p>Ask when it would be acceptable for your child to switch from the narcotic painkiller to ibuprofen if the child wants to. The advantage of ibuprofen is that it doesn’t make the patient drowsy, which means that the patient can get involved in activities, which serve as a distraction from pain. However, ibuprofen also promotes bleeding, so the dentist may not want the patient to use it immediately. Also ask whether it would be acceptable to use more than the over-the-counter dose of ibuprofen (the prescription dose is twice as much).</p></li>
<li><p>Try to schedule the oral surgery just before a week when your child has few or no commitments (e.g., in the summer, at the start of a week when the child has no organized activity, or for a college student, during Winter Break). You can’t know in advance whether the recovery will be easy or difficult, and if it’s difficult, they may need that week.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Our oral surgeon routinely prescribes a course of steroids for all wisdom teeth extractions to cut down on swelling. Both of my sons recovered quickly…don’t know if the steroids helped. Neither needed more than ibuprofen for pain, so I never bothered filling the painkiller prescriptions, altho the oral surgeon did give us those prescriptions in advance.</p>
<p>I realize their relatively easy post-op experiences may not happen for everyone, but the procedure isn’t always rife with complications.</p>
<p>Timely bump- I had never heard of steroid treatment- my D goes in monday for consultation, I will ask about it as she does have asthma ( also won’t have a lot of time off)</p>
<p>DD’s dentist is a Northwestern/UCLA grad with 10 years experience “in the field”. He said
that oral surgeons and orthodontists will ALWAYS recommend removing wisdom teeth because there is no downside, no “control” for leaving them in. A recent news story
compared the preventive removal of wisdom teeth to the removal of everyone’s appendix because some people will develop appendicitis. Apparently the rate of complications from leaving wisdom teeth in place is the same as the rate of appendicitis. My H is European, and wisdom teeth removal is uncommon there. We’re taking a wait and see approach with DD’s wisdom teeth. I had all of mine until last year, when one was pulled because it was easier than trying to put in a filling. It was fast and painless.</p>
<p>My older daughter had 2 of her wisdom teeth out when she was 19, she reacted badly to the pain medication.
It wasn’t fun.</p>
<p>Younger D has had troubles with them bothering her for about a year, but I couldn’t get her to schedule the time to see the dentist. Now they are finally causing enough trouble so that she is willing to take the time.</p>
<p>I still have my wisdom teeth, however I had 4 bicuspids pulled when I was about 11 when I began orthodontia.</p>
<p>Wisdom teeth may impact the teeth right around them, but there is no evidence they will affect the front teeth and make them crooked. They simply do not exert that much pressure. The jaw changes in the young adult mouth and that is what crowds the teeth. This, coincidentally, happens at about the same time the wisdom come in, so people associate the two, but there is not connection. I think some dentists use this fear to their advantage</p>
<p>I think there are reasons to have them removed - my daughter had hers removed - but the fear about the causing crooked teeth is unfounded.</p>
<p>Get the wisdom teeth removed. I have three of mine that are causing me NO END of dental issues as an adult. One became loose and was pulled. I’ll be getting the other three pulled soon. </p>
<p>Our kids both had them pulled their freshman Christmas vacation. Procedure was done in the oral surgeon’s office. DD had local, DS general. DD only had two wisdom teeth on the top…no bottoms. DS had four. Our insurance covered everything but the anesthetic. Odd…do they think you can have this done without it? You would need to check YOUR coverage.</p>
<p>We spent a goodly sum on DD’s orthodontia and her wisdom teeth coming in would have totally screwed that up. DS never had orthodontia so when his came in…we didn’t want to have to deal with it.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s a scam at all. I wish I had had mine pulled years ago.</p>
<p>P.S. DH had all four of his pulled in the late 70s.</p>
<p>Not a scam. There are two potential problems with wisdom teeth: First, they may crowd the other teeth and knock everything out of alignment. </p>
<p>The other problem (my own dentist told me 35 years ago anyway), is that they’re not as strong as the other teeth and subject to all kinds of problems which could involve lots of treatment and possibly later extraction anyway.</p>
<p>The patient will be out of commission for a couple of days at least, so scheduling should be done accordingly. Will also need a ride home, so a driver must be available. And D’s surgeon said she shouldn’t be alone for the rest of the day since she’d been under general anesthesia. DH just took the day off.</p>
<p>Have some tea bags at the ready; they’re great for stopping the bleeding.</p>
<p>Son just had his out. He wanted them out, they bothered him 6 months prior the surgery (he was in school so waited to come home over break). Recovery time wasn’t long. Bleeding stopped within the first two hours. He had some pain pills and a steroidal dosage pack for the inflammation.
I never had mine out–probably should have–my teeth moved a lot because of it.</p>
<p>This is what my dentist’s office recently told me and I believe it because my D who did have her wisdom teeth out, now has crooked, crowded lower teeth which went awry her college sophomore year when she stopped wearing her retainer religiously.</p>
<p>Since teeth move as soon as you stop wearing the retainer- I wouldn’t connect that with having her wisdom teeth out.
They are now advising people to keep wearing their retainer at least every other night. :p</p>
<p>No, I didn’t; that was my point. The conventional wisdom is that you must have your wisdom teeth out in order to protect your orthodontic investment. My D’s teeth shifted during her soph year, despite having had her wisdom teeth out.</p>
<p>My other D, whose wisdom teeth are coming in right now, has perfectly straight teeth, but she does wear her retainer every night.</p>
<p>I got my wisdom teeth out before they burst through my gums so my teeth did not shift. I was on laughing gas (nitrous oxide) and I can honestly say it felt so good. I didn’t feel anything, just pressure. It felt like 2 minutes passed even though to probably took an hour because they took all 4 teeth out at once. I felt like I was in a dream and I couldn’t even talk I was just smiling. Nitrous oxide was my best friend!</p>
<p>The days after were kind of hell. My face was swollen like a chipmunk for 5 days (people in school made fun of me) and my jaw was so sore and in pain, all I did was drink hot tea (which helped a lot!) </p>
<p>I had the same idea about the removal of wisdom teeth being something that was done much too often, and without really needing to be done. It seemed like everyone just had it done at a certain age, without even doubting it. It just seemed weird that something that our bodies grew naturally would be something that automatically needed to be removed. Of the four children in the family, i was the only one that said no to having them taken out.</p>
<p>Now years later i need them out. It is not something that one looks forward to.</p>
<p>The fact is that anyone can look at their own x-rays and see if the teeth are growing in such a way that would effect the rest of the teeth in the mouth. The x-ray will show if the teeth are lined up like the others or if they are growing horizontally, which some do. Doing some online research will tell you of some of the possible hassles that wisdom teeth can offer as well.</p>
<p>There can be so many issues that come from wisdom teeth coming in wrong. While it does seem strange to take something out of your body that grows there naturally, if your mouth does not have the room or they are coming in at a strange angle, which will be obvious on the x-ray, then something will need to be done. </p>
<p>The wisdom teeth coming in at a bad angle will affect the way the other teeth look. It can crowd the mouth and definitely cause teeth to become more crooked.</p>
<p>There are bad issues possible when the teeth erupt partially, and never finish coming through. Whether this happens because there isn’t enough space there or some other reason is not clear. Pericoronitis can happen when the teeth are partially erupted, also known as impacted, and some of the tissue creates a flap that will partially cover the tooth. The tooth can’t be properly cleaned and bacteria thrives there causing infection. It can be incredibly painful and bad cases will need antibiotics.</p>
<p>Found one of the articles that explains that the complications from wisdom tooth (3rd molar) removal exceed the complications of leaving them in place:</p>
<p>My three teenagers all have a blood clotting disorder, and dental extractions are a big deal. My oldest had his four wisdom teeth removed when he was a HS senior. The poor kid wasn’t allowed to take ibuprofen, since it could make the bleeding worse. He was in a lot of pain and he had the worst chipmunk cheeks I’ve ever seen. After the extraction, he bled and bled and bled (even though he took meds that were supposed to prevent the bleeding). It was scary! He missed about a week of school.</p>
<p>After that experience, I’m really hesitant to put the other kids through it. I will have a lengthy discussion with the dentist and/or orthodontist when the subject comes up!</p>
<p>Still have all of my wisdom teeth, all erupted when I was in middle school. I have a round face with a lot of room for teeth, and none of my dentists ever suggested taking any of my wisdom teeth out. Recently, my orthodontist “moved” one of them it into the space previously occupied by a molar which I lost in an ice sledding accident many, many years ago. Morale of the story: if you don’t need to get your wisdom teeth out, they might become useful in the future!</p>
<p>Ibuprofen and aspirin are not recommended after extractions due to bleeding risk. Acetaminophen is suggested, but be careful to avoid overdosing.</p>
<p>But, really, the soreness can be handled with ice packs (from personal experience). I don’t know why narcotics are prescribed routinely, since prescription narcotics are commonly abused (and I know someone who took them as directed and got narcotic withdrawal symptoms after using them up). In addition, it is possible that killing the soreness completely early on may encourage the patient to stop being gentle too early, increasing the risk of a dry socket or other problems (e.g. they say that you can eat normal food in a day or two, but it is really best to stay with soft food for a week).</p>
<p>As far as whether to remove them prophylactically or just watch them and remove them later if they cause trouble, it likely depends on the patient. If they are already causing trouble or have a high risk of causing trouble (e.g. stuck in partial eruption, decay problems, causing decay or problems with adjacent teeth, cyst formation), then prophylactic removal may be warranted. Otherwise (including unerupted impacted teeth), watching them may avoid the risk and cost of removal. However, it is true that US practice tends to be biased in favor of prophylactic removal, while UK practice is the opposite.</p>
<p>In terms of why they commonly get impacted, could it be because the modern diet does not require as much biting and chewing as the ancient human diet, and more biting and chewing exercise would stimulate jaw growth?</p>