Price of Waiting Too Long…

By Dr. Boris Zusin · Published September 2, 2021

The history behind this broken tooth is that it had a very large metal (amalgam) filling for a long time. Unfortunately, at this point the tooth could not be saved — the real question is whether that could have been avoided. The answer is yes.

When I saw this patient for the first time, my recommendation was to crown (cap) this tooth because it was structurally compromised due to the large metal filling and fractures visible in the tooth. The patient kept postponing the necessary work for a variety of reasons, one of them being finances.

So, what now? Well, now it becomes more involved to fix this broken tooth. In fact, you can not fix it. This tooth would have to be removed and replaced by either an implant or a three-unit bridge. So instead of the cost of putting a crown on the compromised tooth and preserving it long-term, this patient is looking at much more substantial costs of extracting the tooth and replacing it with an implant or a bridge. In the end, this patient did not benefit financially by waiting.

Unfortunately, in dentistry, waiting too long does not make things better or make problems go away. Most of the time, problems get worse and it becomes more involved and costly to fix them. So the lesson here is this: the best time to fix a problem is when it first appears. It is usually the least involved and least costly way to repair the damage.