Pulp death and dental abscess.Image taken from http://www.andoverdmd.com/treatment_root_canal.html
Endodontic treatment is a common dental procedure that removes damaged living tissue called “dental pulp” from inside the root canals of a tooth. The pulp contains blood vessels and nerves. It is often referred to as root canal treatment or root canal therapy.
Sometimes, the pulp inside the tooth becomes infected by bacteria or damaged by a traumatic injury to the tooth. However, the most common cause of pulp death is a fractured or cracked tooth and deep tooth cavity which can expose the pulp to the bacteria found in saliva. This can result in inflammation, infection and, eventually, necrosis (pulp death).
Endodontic treatment is also known as root canal treatment. It is a procedure to clean, shape and fill the root canals of a diseased tooth. Our anterior tooth (incisors and cuspid) has one canal normally except for lower anterior teeth whereby they may have two. Bicuspids and molars have more than one canal. Continue reading →