Here at Sheppard Centre Dental, we believe that the best teeth are your own, and we want to ensure you do not lose any of them. Successful root canal treatment lets you keep your tooth. The only other option is to have your tooth removed. If you notice a problem with a tooth, do not wait until it hurts.

Keeping your tooth helps to prevent your other teeth from drifting out of line and causing jaw problems or gum disease. Saving a natural tooth avoids replacing it with a bridge or an implant.

The treatment removes the infected, injured or dead pulp from a tooth. There is a space inside the hard layers of each tooth. It is called the root canal system, and it is filled with soft dental pulp made up of nerves and blood vessels that help the tooth grow and develop. Once a tooth is fully-grown, it can survive without a pulp. If a tooth’s pulp becomes infected, a root canal (or endodontic treatment) is needed. When this treatment is performed, the pulp is removed.

Root canal treatment may be completed in one appointment, or it may take two or more visits. It depends on the complexity of the root canal system and the degree of pulp damage. If the infection spreads from the tooth to the bone (or abscess), it may have to be drained before the root can be filled.