What are the symptoms of nerve damage caused by wisdom tooth extraction

If you are not careful when extracting wisdom teeth, you may damage the nerves, which is quite harmful to the patient's health and often causes certain sequelae. If the infection is serious, it may even cause great harm to the health of the brain. The feeling of the lower lip under the teeth is often weakened, leading to numbness of the lips. This situation is quite harmful and should be treated in time.

What are the symptoms of nerve damage caused by wisdom tooth extraction?

The deeper the wisdom tooth is located and the closer it is to the nerve, the more likely it is to affect the inferior alveolar nerve. When extracting maxillary wisdom teeth, there is no problem of nerve damage. The maxillary nerve is the posterior superior alveolar nerve, which has a lower sensitivity. The nerve damage we mentioned is generally the damage to the inferior alveolar nerve when extracting mandibular wisdom teeth. The inferior alveolar nerve is a sensory nerve. Once it is damaged, the sensation of the mandibular teeth and lower lip will be weakened, resulting in numbness of the lower lip and loss of sensation of the mandibular teeth.

What to do if you have damaged nerves

Generally speaking, damage to the inferior alveolar nerve is caused by compression when the tooth root is extracted, which will cause the nerve to swell, but the nerve is not cut off, so it can be recovered by taking medicine. Small doses of cortical hormones, dexamethasone, prednisone hydrochloride, etc. can be used to reduce edema around the nerves; or multivitamins, methylcobalamin, etc. can be taken to help nerve recovery.

Most injuries to the inferior alveolar nerve can recover. If the injury is minor, it can be recovered in 1 to 2 weeks. If the injury is severe, it will take six months to a year. If after one year, the nerve damage has not fully recovered and the lip numbness still exists, these symptoms will not go away.

You can use minimally invasive tooth extraction to cut the wisdom tooth as much as possible and remove it. Whether nerve damage can be recovered depends mainly on the extent of the damage. If the tooth is extracted improperly and the instrument damages the nerve, the injury will be serious and the recovery will be slow, or even impossible. If there is a certain amount of friction and compression between the tooth root and the nerve when the tooth root is extracted, the situation can be recovered.

How long should I eat liquid food after wisdom tooth extraction?

You can eat some semi-liquid food 1 to 2 days after having your wisdom teeth removed, but you cannot eat completely liquid food because liquid food is not nutritious and will cause the wound to heal slowly. As long as you can open your mouth, you can eat normally and eat light food. Avoid spicy or irritating foods, which will hinder wound healing.