You may visit a doctor whenever you have a headache or any such issue. Or when the case becomes severe, like when you feel some pain in your heart, you visit a specialist who analyzes the situation and prescribes it accordingly. Similar is the case with a toothache. If you have a severe toothache, you may end up losing your life. Therefore, you must visit a highly trained and professional endodontist to get rid of it. They have multiple ways of repairing tissues inside your tooth. They let you know about the cause of the pain you are suffering from and diagnose it also. They are mostly known for performing dental root canal treatments, which all dentists don’t do.
Let’s take a look at what an endodontist is, what he/she treats and when you need to visit one.
What is an Endodontist?
Endodontists are highly trained professionals who help patients get rid of complex tooth problems that may affect their tooth pulp in one way or another. And for treating root tissues and dental pulp, they use advanced technology and equipment. They try their level best to help the patients keep using the same natural teeth rather than asking them to install the artificial ones. But since they cure tooth pulp also, let’s see what it is and how endodontic treatment cures it.
What is Tooth Pulp?
The tooth pulp is what you can call the blood vessels or nerves of teeth present inside your teeth. Whenever you see in the mirror with your mouth open, the layer of skin you see is called enamel. However, the pulp part helps the teeth grow, particularly in children. The teeth also start to decay when you don’t care for them much, don’t clean them or injure them. As a result of this, you may fall prey to pulpitis which refers to the infected or inflamed tooth pulp. Due to this, the patient feels severe pain in the teeth.
And when it becomes severe, you may have to visit a doctor also in order to avoid any serious medical condition. So, a dentist plays a vital role under such circumstances. And if the case is severe, as we mentioned previously, the dentist would refer you to an endodontist who knows how to get rid of this pain and how to perform the treatment successfully.
How does a dentist treats as compared to an endodontist?
We’ve mentioned previously that every endodontist is a dentist, but very few dentists are endodontists. You need to have training of at least 2 years to know how to solve complex teeth-related issues. During this training, they get an idea of how to diagnose using the latest techniques and what they need to do to make a patient feel relieved. They are often called as “Root Canal Dentists” also since they are commonly known to cure root canals or tooth decay.
Both general dentists and endodontists can perform the “Root Canal Treatment”, but the former isn’t really good at it because they don’t do it quite often. They have to cure issues like cleaning a patient’s teeth or taking care of them. But the latter does it more than 25 times per week, they are specialized to perform it. That is what makes endodontists the experts in the field. Since endodontics treatment involves various surgeries also, take a look at a few of them:
● Endodontic Retreatment
This treatment is done to remove and replace any material used during the previous treatment that didn’t work well or didn’t last long enough.
● Emergency Surgery
If you have any dental injury or you have damaged your teeth accidentally, the only way you can cure it is by surgery. And under severe injuries, only emergency surgery can help. This also involves the treatment of some tooth infections that are causing toothache and aren’t letting you sleep properly.
● Tooth Extraction
Sometimes, the tissues of your teeth are too weak because of damaged teeth. The best way then is to remove the tooth rather than keep going with those weak tissues. So, tooth extraction surgery is done under such circumstances.
● Endodontic Surgery
This is associated with the removal of the root or tip of your tooth. This happens mostly when there is an issue with the interior of your teeth.
Apart from the surgeries mentioned above, there is much more an endodontic treatment can offer. You just need to ensure that you have chosen the right endodontist for your treatment. The rest of the job depends on the experience, knowledge and training of the endodontist.
What are the Costings for Endodontic Treatment in Singapore?
In the past, patients had to bear a lot of pain after an operation or surgery, even if it was successful. But with time, things got changed. The doctors found ways of resolving post-surgery pain issues by using the latest technology. As far as root canal therapy in Singapore is concerned, it depends on whether you have chosen a specialist for this purpose or a simple dentist. A general practitioner won’t charge you as much as an endodontist because of more significant experience and capability of getting the job done quickly and efficiently. But despite choosing an inexperienced dentist, you will have to pay in between $300 and $800.
The second factor is your tooth’s location which isn’t easy to determine most of the times. The reason is that it decides whether the affected part will take more time to get resolved or not. For front teeth, you will have to pay in between $700 and $1000. In case of pre-molars, the 4th and 5th tooth, you may have to pay around $1000. The reason is that they have 2 roots and the pulp chamber is also bigger. For molars, the case is entirely different. They are the most expensive because they contain 3 roots and are larger in size. The roots are never easy to navigate and that’s what the endodontists charge for, to find them and treat them. This may cost you in between $1000 and $1500.
The cost of a dental crown will also affect the overall cost of your treatment. This will depend on the quality of the material you have chosen. Apart from that, there are certain miscellaneous costs also. For example, you will have regular consultation sessions with the endodontist, who will guide you about the following procedure. You will have to pay around $100-150 for that. Moreover, the X-rays cost will also be there, which is around $250. The anaesthesia will also cost you some amount in between $50 and $500.
If the government subsidies are available in Singapore and you are eligible to apply for them, you may get a discount of around $250, but that doesn’t seem enough as compared to the overall cost of the treatment. Also, the success ratio of Root Canal Treatment is very less, so make sure that you make the right choice before going for it.
Conclusion
Having your health insurance done in Singapore is one of the pathways to a better and cheap endodontic treatment. Otherwise, you may not be able to pay all the dues in time which will affect your treatment as well which is not what you actually want.
