Toothache: Minor Pain or Major Inconvenience?
Even our smartest, most health-conscious patients are guilty of it: they ignore a toothache, hoping it will just go away. That’s not entirely bad; some tooth sensitivity is incredibly painful, and it can come on very suddenly. But when “temporary” tooth sensitivity lingers through more than a few meals, or a few days, it’s not temporary.
It’s a toothache, and ignoring it is a bad idea.
That’s when we hope our patients are smart enough to ignore that little voice that says, “it’s no big deal.” Because maybe it’s not a big deal – a small, very localized cavity can cause a lot of pain but be very quick and easy to remedy – and maybe the toothache will be a big deal if they ignore it for too long.
We’ve heard a lot of justification for waiting from some of our Uptown Houston-area patients, but mostly what we hear is, “I’m glad I finally came in to have you look at this.”