Wisdom Tooth Extraction Benefits

Wisdom teeth, or third molars, are the farthest back molars in the mouth and usually don’t show up until late or early adolescence. Frequently misaligned, these teeth can be challenging to maintain and impact your oral health. Wisdom tooth extraction is a complex surgical treatment that dentists often recommend. 

Roughly 70 per cent of people between 20 to 40 years old in Singapore have an impacted tooth. Even with the high percentage, is it important to have your wisdom teeth removed? What are the benefits of extracting an impacted tooth? 

A wisdom teeth extraction is a surgical procedure to remove impacted wisdom teeth that non-surgical methods cannot remove. A wisdom tooth extraction in Singapore is performed by a dental surgeon to remove the four impacted permanent adult teeth located at the back of the mouth. This helps to reduce the risk of infection or other dental issues like caries. If you’re experiencing wisdom tooth pain, then you’ll likely need to have them surgically extracted. 

Most often, wisdom tooth extractions are performed under local anaesthetic. In some cases, wisdom tooth pain can be immense. In these cases, intravenous sedation can be provided when a patient feels highly anxious about the procedure.

Should You Remove Impacted Wisdom Teeth

Wisdom teeth typically emerge in late adolescence or early adulthood. In some cases, wisdom teeth may not have enough room to emerge and get stuck beneath the gum tissue, often growing sideways – a condition known as impacted wisdom teeth. 

Impacted wisdom teeth can cause various problems, including pain, inflammation, infection, and fluid-filled cysts. While an impacted wisdom tooth may not initially cause problems, it can lead to serious complications.

If the tooth is not removed, a benign tumor, for example, could develop in the jaw. A dentigerous cyst is a little bulge that may appear without your knowledge. Benign cysts frequently have no symptoms when small, but they can trap food and bacterial plaque, increasing the risk for caries and gum disease. Also, if you often get sinus infections, it can be due to pressure from an impacted upper wisdom tooth.

If your dental surgeon recommends, impacted teeth are best removed before they cause long-term damage to your oral health.

What You Should Know About Wisdom Teeth Removal

Before you truly appreciate the benefits of wisdom teeth removal, understanding the basics of these third molars is essential to deciding when they should be removed.

The wisdom teeth are the last to erupt among the molars. They enter near the region where your jaw hinges together at the back of your mouth. Wisdom teeth often erupt around the age of 20.

Our dental team may not always recommend patients extract their wisdom teeth as the surgical procedure may be unnecessary. If not done properly, the removal of wisdom teeth can cause immense discomfort, especially if the wisdom tooth surgery isn’t required in the first place.

You might be able to avoid extraction of wisdom tooth pain if you have healthy teeth. Further, if wisdom teeth erupt and your jaw has enough room, your chewing may benefit. However, most people do not have enough space in their jaw for their wisdom teeth to erupt without pain or discomfort.

Wisdom teeth extractions are common, but it is a highly complex surgical procedure that must be performed by a qualified dental surgeon.

Benefits of A Wisdom Tooth Extraction

A wisdom tooth extraction procedure is necessary when the impacted wisdom tooth negatively affects the surrounding soft tissues leading to repeated infections to the tooth or the adjacent teeth. Extracting the wisdom tooth will remove the source of pain and alleviate the risk of infection to the adjacent teeth.

The decision to remove a wisdom tooth can seem unpleasant, but it may save you time and money in the long run. Here are five reasons why: 

1. Decrease Risk of Dental Caries Maintaining proper oral hygiene around impacted teeth can be difficult. As food, plaque and harmful bacteria can get stuck between impacted or erupted teeth, removing a wisdom tooth can reduce the risk of dental caries in the adjacent molars.
   
2. Relieve Headaches The other teeth are already developed and in place as the wisdom teeth emerge in late adolescence. Wisdom teeth will try to push other teeth out of the way if there isn’t enough room on the jaw. This intense pressure on the teeth can cause excruciating headaches, which can be relieved by removing the teeth.
   
3. Avoid Periodontal Disease When your teeth shift in the mouth, it can make brushing or flossing difficult. This uneven space is a hiding place for harmful microorganisms that could cause periodontal disease if not treated quickly enough, leading to tooth damage and even loss of an essential permanent molar.
   
4. Reduce Chances of Oral Infection As your wisdom teeth grow in and push other teeth, your mouth may be prone to infection. Early removal of wisdom teeth can help lower the likelihood of bacterial infections. The discomfort in your mouth from all of the pressure may be so intense that you don’t recognize you have an infection immediately.
   
5. Avoid Damaging your Jaw Bacteria can thrive in impacted wisdom teeth, leading to cysts or tumors that enter the jawbone and cause severe temporomandibular joint pain that will require treatment from a TMJ specialist.

When your wisdom teeth finally emerge, they can cause intense pain. This is why it’s essential that you schedule routine dental examinations so that your dentist is able to prevent complications that can lead to infections or diseases.

The Process of Wisdom Tooth Removal

Our dentist will discuss your treatment options with you to identify potential risks and the cost of wisdom tooth removal in Singapore before the procedure begins. Once we have discussed your options, our dentist will anaesthetise the area with local anaesthesia to numb the area in order to extract the wisdom tooth safely. Our clinic applies a surface numbing gel before the local anaesthetic injection to give almost pain-free analgesia. 

At any time, feel free to discuss your concerns regarding analgesia with your dentist so that we can make the experience as comfortable as possible for you.

Once the tooth area is numb, our dentist will access the impacted wisdom tooth through an incision in the gum. Surrounding bone may also need to be removed with surgical drills. You shouldn’t feel any pain during the procedure, but you may feel some pressure or vibrations from the surgical tools. 

Your wisdom tooth may need to be divided to be removed. Using specially designed hand instruments, pressure will be applied from various sides of the tooth in order to deliver the crown and roots, whether in whole or in pieces.

Once the entire wisdom tooth is out, the site will be checked and washed to ensure it is clean. A pack will be placed to clot the blood and the area will receive stitches to aid in the healing process.

Our dentist will provide detailed after-care instructions for how to optimise your healing, along with a prescription for mouthwash and analgesics. We’ll schedule a follow-up appointment 7 to 10 days after the surgically-removed wisdom tooth extraction. Our dentist will review your healing progress during the follow-up session and remove the stitches. 

If you have any concerns along the way, our dentist and dental assistant team are always available to address your questions.

Wisdom Tooth Extraction Cost

Visiting your dentist every six months or as recommended allows your dentist to check for bacteria development, loosened gums, or tooth decay in your wisdom teeth. Dentists can also use X-rays to ensure that no cysts or tumors are forming behind the gums.

Wisdom tooth surgery is complex, and proper extraction is highly technical. Depending on the case and its complexity, our wisdom tooth extraction price in Singapore ranges from $872.00 to $1,526.00.

MediSave for a wisdom tooth extraction may help Singaporeans and Permanent Residents pay for certain surgical procedures such as implant treatments, surgical extraction of wisdom or a fractured tooth, or placement of dental implants. TEETH @ Tiong Bahru is accredited by the Ministry of Health and Central Provident Fund (CPF) Board.

We always encourage you to meet with our dental team for a consultation to address any concerns related to your particular wisdom tooth extraction and to discuss the cost of a wisdom tooth extraction treatment. By staying on top of your routine dental visits, our dentist will discuss any potential problems with your wisdom teeth, the benefits of removal, and the risks involved.