Root Canal Treatment
Root canal therapy may be recommended for teeth that are severely decayed, infected, or broken. The main benefit is that it allows you to maintain your teeth for an extended period of time rather than having to extract or replace them.
In order to treat the compromised tooth, the dentist will drill into its core. The infected nerve is subsequently removed, the canals are smoothed and shaped using special files, the canals are then rinses and irrigated using sodium hypochloride which ensures no pulp tissue or infection is left in the canals. The canals are then filled with a special material called Gutta Percha that seals off the root canals.
A root canal is part of a naturally occurring space within a tooth that consists of the pulp chamber, the main canal, and more intricate anatomical branches that may connect the root canals to each other or to the surface of the root. The smaller branches are most frequently found near the root end (apex) but may be encountered anywhere along the root length.
Unfortunately, after root canal therapy the tooth often becomes brittle. To protect the tooth from fracture, it is recommended that the tooth be restored and fortified with a crown.