Four Mistakes To Avoid When Recovering From A Tooth Extraction Procedure
If you want tooth extractions to be successful, you need to take care of yourself in the days and weeks after the procedures to help your mouth heal up as soon as possible.
There are a variety of different threats during the recovering period after tooth extraction, like infection risk and persistent discomfort. However, you'll recover quickly if you take care to avoid these four mistakes while you're healing:
Eating hot foods or drinking hot beverages
Eating or drinking hot items is inadvisable after tooth extraction because it can lead to burns in the mouth that can both aggravate discomfort and slow down healing.
Your mouth will initially be numbed after the tooth extraction procedure with local anesthesia. This will make it difficult to sense temperature in food and drink. It's easy for those who have just undergone a tooth extraction to unknowingly cause a severe burn to their mouths when eating or drinking.
Even after local anesthesia wears off, hot food and drink can burn the extraction site and delay the healing process by damaging new tissues growing in.
Sleeping with your head lying flat
Your dentist is likely to advise you to keep your head elevated after the tooth extraction procedure. You might want to sleep with some extra pillows under your head for several nights after the procedure.
Keeping your head elevated is important because it promotes drainage of any blood or fluids. It also prevents throbbing and minimizes soreness around the wound site by preventing blood from building up in the area.
Smoking immediately after the procedure
Smoking has a tendency to hinder optimal circulation. Circulation in the blood vessels is important in the process of healing because it allows cells to come in and build new tissue.
If you smoke, you should avoid smoking as long as possible after the procedure. It's best to completely abstain from smoking until you feel that you have healed entirely from the tooth extraction procedure.
Neglecting oral hygiene in the days after the procedure
You might be tempted to avoid oral hygiene tasks like brushing after the extraction procedure because of discomfort.
While it's true that you won't want to be brushing directly on the extraction site until you've healed up fairly well, you still need to be brushing other parts of your mouth. Keeping your mouth clean after tooth extraction is an important part of avoiding and infection in your extraction wounds. Ask your dentist to recommend an antiseptic mouthwash that will clean your mouth and prevent bacteria from proliferating around the extraction site.
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