Understanding Root Canal Procedures

It's Like Pulling Teeth: How Teeth Are Actually Pulled In A Modern Dental Clinic

23 February 2019

Diane Mason

Once upon a time, if you had a tooth that was giving you trouble, you walked into your barber's​ office, sat down in the chair, paid your dollar or two, and then the barber would get out a pliers and begin yanking on that tooth with everything he had. Nowadays, dentistry has come a very long way. You no longer go to a barber to pull a tooth; you go to a dentist. You do not go to a barber's germ-covered chair and shop, but to a sterile dentist's chair and clinic. Instead of a pliers, the dentist uses a number of tools to extract a bad tooth. If you need a tooth pulled, the process is so much easier now that it no longer supports the old adage, "it is like pulling teeth." (In fact, this adage may come to mean quite the opposite, given the easier way in which teeth are now pulled.)

Numb

​There was no numbing agent back in the day besides alcohol, and that really did not numb things up very much anyway. Now, the Novocain takes all of the pain out of having a tooth pulled. The only thing you feel is a lot of pressure as the dentist pushes your head down while pulling up on the tooth.

Excise

​A tooth is pulled easier when the gum tissue is cut open to reveal the root of the tooth. A scalpel is typically used to manage the incision. A flap may be created out of the gum tissue, showing even more of the root and allowing the dentist to cut into the tooth root to loosen it. 

Wiggle and Pull

​The dentist will wiggle the tooth after the root has been exposed. If there are good signs that the tooth is moving, the dentist will then take a dental tool similar to a pliers, grab the tooth, and give the tooth a good tug. It may remove on the first tug, and it may not until the fifteenth wiggle and tug maneuver. It just depends on the strength of the root, but if the tooth is bad enough, then the root will not be as strong as you think. 

Cutting the Tooth Out

​If you have a particularly stubborn tooth, the dentist may need to keep exposing more root and cutting it with a dental rotary sawing tool. More gum tissue may be cut as well. Then the dentist clears out the root pocket, sews up the hole, and you are done. 

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