Failed apicectomy

[Grant 21]

Hi

I had a root filling about 5 years ago on my front tooth, which unfortuantely failed and had to be redone. The new root filling did not work either and I was suffering from recurrent episodes of pain.

Finally the hospital did an apicectomy two years ago which failed soon after that and they redid the apicectomy last year but recently that has proved to have failed as well.

My dentist says that these problems are due to a root fracture on this tooth and suggests removing the tooth and having an implant. He says that doing any more root canals and apicectomies would be pointless.

I would like to know if there are any other options available to me to save this tooth because I rather save the tooth if it is at all possible.

[Dr Mohsen J. Esfahani]

Thank you for your post.

A tooth that has had two root fillings and two apiecetomies and still has problems is probably a very compromised tooth. You can forever redo root fillings but if there is a crack in the root, redoing root canals is unlikely to work. So such treatment is likely to cost you time and money without long term success.

I would recommend that you consider alternatives such as extraction +/- gap, denture, bridge or an implant.