Go ahead with molar extraction or not?

[Vyse]

A bit of background. I believe one of my chins may have tooth problems due to an injury where he banged his jaw on a platform. One of the vets said his lower left hand side of the jaw had a kind of step in it.

Ever since March last year Ive been taking him to the vet to get his teeth trimmed at the following intervals, 2.5 months, 2 months, 2 months, 1 month, 1 month, 1 month. The observation was that he was drooling and hence need the spur trimmed.

The tooth that is causing the problem seems to be one of the upper left molars that ends up forming a spur and pokes him in the cheek. In addition, the majority of his lower left molars have rotten away I believe.

During my last visit my chin was given Baytril then Septrin, as there seemed to be a tooth infection around the tooth that was producing the spurs.

He has began drooling again the past few days. I am contemplating putting him to sleep as this has gone on far too long. But when the tooth spurs are removed he general acts as normal, stuffing his face.

As a last resort is it worth extracting this tooth that is causing the spurs. The only reason I ask is that it is infected and maybe easier to remove than normal.

Another thing is that I don't understand how the tooth flanking the problematic molar manage to wear themselves down. Because the molars below are said to have mostly rotten away. Every time he has been taken in for treatment the filling is only carried out on that one tooth.

Can you guys please give me some direction please.

Thank You

 

[ticklechin]

The vet needs to probe the tooth to see if its loose and a x-ray needs to be taken of this immediate situation-if the tooth is loose its going to fall out anyway and will require little manipulaton to be removed. If the tooth is still firmly anchored, then the surgery becomes serious-the tooth can break off leaving enough behind to grow back, the tooth can break off and die, the mandible or maxilla can break during removal, since there is a active infection, osteomylitis is a real possibility along with URIs, removal of the tooth IMO and my experience is a last resort when the alternative is death. That said, if the tooth is succesfully removed ( be prepared to hand feed for a LONG time) filings will still be in the chins future-the adjacent teeth-meaning those next to and opposing will drift to fill in the missing space, this will cause further malocclusion and corrective filings will still be needed.