What is a wisdom tooth?
The teeth in a human jaw are divided into four categories — incisors, canines, premolars, and molars:
Molars are the big teeth at the end of your jaws, most helpful for grinding the food you eat and breaking it into the smallest size so that it becomes easier to swallow. An average human being has six molars each in upper and lower jaw. With three on either side of each jaw. The first molars are generally the first permanent teeth to be seen in a child’s mouth at the age of around six years.
The second molars start erupting at the age of around 14 to 15 years, and the third molars at the age of around 17 to 21 years.
Does everyone have wisdom teeth?
Heredity and race play an important role in deciding if you will have wisdom teeth or not. Some people never develop any wisdom teeth at all, while others get only one or two instead of four. It is believed that humans will eventually evolve to not have any wisdom teeth at all, although that process could take thousands of years.
Why do wisdom teeth erupt more painfully than other teeth?
For that, you will have to blame evolution and the progress in our cooking methods!
Hundreds of thousands of years ago, when food was raw or much more unrefined compared to now, our ancestors needed all the sets of molars to grind the food.
With evolution, our diet started comprising of softer and well-cooked foods. And gradually, the need for extra molars to chew started decreasing. The size of the jaws started to decrease as well, and now we are at a point where the jaws of majority of the population are too small to accommodate all the three sets of molars in their proper position.
This is why the wisdom teeth tend to bite the cheeks, nick the tongue, or apply pressure on their neighboring teeth while eruption. They are very often only partially erupted in the mouth.
Why is my child having pain with their wisdom tooth?
When the jaws of a person are too small to accommodate the wisdom tooth, or when the wisdom tooth is tilted instead of straight, it can cause pain as it tries to erupt. When the jaws are small, the wisdom teeth get locked inside the bone. Or if they are tilted, they get locked against other teeth. When they try to erupt, they exert pressure against the bone or the teeth and hence are painful. Wisdom teeth can also be difficult to clean and tend to become decayed very quickly, causing pain.
Symptoms of wisdom tooth trouble
Continuous pain in that particular side of the jaw, difficulty opening the mouth, swollen and/or bleeding gums in that particular area, and frequent headaches affecting that particular side are some of the most common symptoms of an erupting wisdom tooth. Once the wisdom tooth erupts, these symptoms should resolve on their own.
However, if you are having repeated episodes of such pain, it might suggest that the tooth is having a problem erupting and you should consult your dentist.
Is it necessary to remove the wisdom teeth?
There are two different schools of thought. The first one says that all wisdom teeth should be removed for everyone, irrespective of whether they are causing pain at that moment. The reasoning is that waiting for the problem to get worse is not sensible and removing the wisdom teeth can make the rest of the teeth easier to maintain.
The second school of thought says that wisdom teeth should only be removed once they start causing a problem. Hundreds of thousands of people live with their wisdom teeth without any problem. Saving patients from unnecessary surgery and expenditure are the drivers behind this more conservative approach.
Is wisdom tooth extraction painful?
With the anesthesia, the procedure of removing the wisdom tooth is virtually painless. Once the dentist gives you local anesthesia, the area will be pretty numb for a few hours and you won’t feel a thing.
The removal may require cutting through some part of your gum and bone if necessary — but anesthesia means you won’t have any pain during the procedure.
If needed, the dentist might need to stitch up the area of surgery. The stitches are usually removed after seven to 10 days.
In order to minimize pain after the procedure, it is important to follow the instructions given by your dentist regarding medicines, diet, and the precautions that you need to take for the initial 24 to 48 hours after the procedure.
Conclusion
The removal of a wisdom tooth is a very routine procedure with minimum discomfort. It is considered to be the most common minor oral surgical procedure performed in the world. Depending on the complexity of the extraction, a general surgeon may refer the case to an oral surgeon.
In either case, suffering from continuous pain and discomfort by keeping the wisdom teeth in the mouth is not worth the trouble. No kind of replacements are needed once the wisdom teeth are removed.
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