Most often when patients visit a dental office, the chief complaint involves signs of blackening in teeth due to dental caries occurrence. They demand the dentist to place a filling material in their teeth after removing the blackened carious part. This may not be possible in all cases. Sometimes the dentist advises them to undergo a specialized type of treatment involving extirpation of dental pulp of tooth followed by filling of the root canals of tooth and restoration of the crown portion of their tooth by another filling material. This whole process is termed as root canal treatment.

Following are the conditions which necessitate your teeth to undergo root canal treatment,

• Presence of localized pain in a tooth. Pain may be of mild to moderate intensity involving a throbbing sensation. Intensity of pain may change on changing posture,
• Presence of localized swelling which may range from very slight to somewhat pronounced. It typically occurs in the area of tooth’s root tip,
• Pain on biting or chewing in a tooth,
• Severe pain on taking hot or cold liquids in the presence of severe tooth structure loss due to dental decay,
• Pain in a tooth following a previous filling treatment,
• Cracked teeth due to sudden occlusal trauma,
• A pus draining fistula in the area of a tooth’s root tip,
• Presence of a cystic lesion in peri apical area of a tooth,
• Extension of carious lesion into the nerves of a tooth termed as exposure of a tooth’s nerve. This condition is seen and judged by the dentist on examination. It is not necessary to have pain in such situations,
• Individually darkened teeth following an episode of tooth trauma due to an accident or severe blow in the past requires a root canal treatment,
• Pain in the tooth following a previously failed root canal treatment.