Week 10

Mugi S -

Hello everyone and welcome to week ten! At internship this week, I observed many simple and routine procedures such as seating crowns and fillings. When the general dentist is seating a crown, it means he is placing the permanent crown and removing your temporary crown. This is a relatively shorter patient visit but involves the dentist checking for some very important things: marginal integrity, mesial and distal contacts, as well as occlusion. Marginal integrity means that the margin is sealed and there are no visible open gaps on the edge where the crown and tooth touch because this could allow bacteria and decay to form. The mesial and distal contacts are the points on your teeth where they touch the adjacent teeth and the dentist will check to ensure it is tight enough because any open contacts will result in trapped food or inability to floss. Lastly, occlusion is the contact between your teeth when your mouth is closed. For this, articulating paper (or also called bite paper) is used to put between the patient’s bite. They are then asked to tap and grind their teeth, based on the marked points on the teeth the dentist may have to do adjustments. 

On Monday, there was one interesting patient who came in for a simple implant, however the x-ray scans showed that there was a partial tooth root still left in the canal and it was not completely empty. The dentist was unable to fully retrieve the affixed root and he had to instead use a scalpel to cut her gums completely open. With the patient’s gums exposed, he was able to remove the small root of the tooth without damaging the nerves. He then placed bone graft in the canal and a membrane layer to fill up the gums and allow the tissue to heal. The implant procedure had to be postponed after the patient’s gum had healed. 

That’s all for this week, next week I will share a summary and conclusion of my project for the last blog post! See you all then!!

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Comments:

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    neha_k
    Hi Mugi! This is so interesting! The dentist just visually gauges marginal integrity along with mesial and distal contact points, correct? Are there times when the tooth can visually deceive you and there is actually a hidden problem area?
    April 24, 2024 at 12:40 am -
      mugi_s
      Yes, the dentist visually gauges this. Yes, there are issues that are very small that cannot be easily identifies on an x-ray or seen by the dentist in the patient's mouth. This is why more extensive x-rays such as panoramic x-rays and exams are used.
      April 29, 2024 at 10:08 am -
    Rayan B
    Hi Mugi. This is quite intriguing. I'm curious why does the dentist have to make sure that there is no gaps when biting to place a crown.
    April 27, 2024 at 3:12 pm -
      mugi_s
      Hi Rayan! The dentist has to make sure that the teeth have proper placement in the bite in order to avoid the creation of spaces, this can make the crown prone to dislodgment.
      April 29, 2024 at 9:48 am -
    georgia_b
    Hi Mugi! Guessing you didn't get to talk to the patient, but do you know if there were any symptoms or pain in their mouth before they came in? Or was this unexpected?
    April 29, 2024 at 11:37 am -

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