Drinking alcohol can be a pleasant experience. It makes you feel happy and relaxed, but it does have some severe consequences that are not always readily apparent. Alcohol is bad for your teeth in many ways, including the fact that it causes tooth decay. In this article, we’re going to talk about one of these effects: how drinking alcohol can cause a dental abscess emergency!
What’s Dental Abscess?
A dental abscess is a pocket of inflamed tissue near the tooth, and it can be excruciating. Fortunately, most cases are not serious; they often resolve on their own with no treatment required!
However, if you ignore an abscess for too long (or don’t know to look for one in the first place), it could cause other problems that require more intensive medical attention – like alcohol or drug addiction. This means that even though alcohol may seem harmless at times (and sometimes fun!), drinking enough of it can cause a dental abscess.
Now let’s talk about how exactly alcohol causes these kinds of dental emergencies.
How Alcohol Causes A Dental Abscess
There are many different kinds of bacteria in your mouth, and some of them use sugar as their primary food source. The first time you drink alcohol, it may not be a problem; the sugars and starches from foods like bread or fruit (which can stick to your teeth) will dilute any bacteria that try to eat them.
However, once those foods have been removed by brushing or flossing, the remaining plaque is mostly just made up of harmful bacteria – which means there’s nothing left to stop them from using the sugar-rich environment created by drinking alcohol!
This causes even more growth than normal for these types of microbes, making an abscess very likely if you don’t take care of the problem right away.
What Can You Do?
Fortunately, a dental abscess usually isn’t that serious – if you get it treated early enough! The best thing to do is just rinse your mouth with warm salt water after drinking alcohol (or eating anything starchy). This will help kill any bacteria and reduce the likelihood of an infection.
If this doesn’t work for some reason, or if your symptoms start getting worse before they get better, then see your dentist ASAP so he can treat the condition properly. If left untreated, you could end up dealing with all kinds of pain and other problems in addition to swelling and inflammation at the site of where the infection was! That may not sound too bad, but the truth is, it’s definitely better to take care of it early.
All in all, alcohol can cause a dental abscess if you’re not careful! If you keep your mouth clean after drinking (or eating sugary food), this won’t be an issue. However, suppose the sugar-feeding cycle continues long enough. In that case, even one night’s bad decisions could have serious consequences – so remember to brush and floss properly before going to bed every day!
What if You Already Have Dental Abscess?
If you already have a dental abscess, the best thing is to visit your dentist as soon as possible. He’ll clean out the affected area and make sure it heals up properly – which will get rid of any pain or other symptoms right away!
In some cases, you may need antibiotics if bacteria end up causing an infection that spreads beyond just one tooth; this means going on medication for a few days to deal with the problem at its root source. If left untreated, even more serious complications could arise, like jawbone damage, so don’t risk taking matters into your own hands. See a professional!
Remember: alcohol can cause a dental abscess if it’s not treated correctly from the start. Even a few nights of neglecting your oral health habits could have serious consequences, so try to avoid drinking if you know it’s going to be hard for you to brush and floss properly before bed!
Signs That You Need Emergency Treatment for Dental Abscess
A dental abscess is usually an emergency, so you should seek professional help for this problem as soon as possible. However, some signs may indicate seeing your dentist immediately instead of taking any chances with home remedies.
If the pain in your gums gets worse – not better – after 24 hours, even if you’ve been regularly rinsing and flossing, then it could be a sign that something’s wrong. Even more problematic than just regular dental abscesses are those caused by gum infections. These can spread throughout the jawbone very quickly, which means they require immediate treatment to avoid long-term complications like osteomyelitis (a type of bone infection).
Even though toothaches cause swelling near or around the tooth, it doesn’t always mean that you have a dental abscess. Still, if this is the case, then your dentist can give you antibiotics to treat it. Other symptoms of toothaches are a pain when biting down on food or pressure above/below the affected area of teeth – so these kinds of problems usually require immediate treatment by a professional just in case.
If any part of your face starts getting more sensitive than usual around where an infection was located, then there’s also cause for concern! This could be because pus has spread beyond your jawbone and into other tissues within your mouth, which means you may need oral surgery immediately to avoid long-term complications like septic shock. If not treated early enough, even death could result from such a serious complication – so don’t wait to seek help even if you’re feeling well enough to go about your daily routine.
Any time a dental abscess is causing you severe pain or other issues, this problem needs to be treated as soon as possible! This will make the recovery process easier now and prevent long-term complications from developing down the line.
Make sure you avoid drinking alcohol and eating sugary foods before going to sleep to keep your mouth clean at all times; otherwise, things can get nasty really quickly! Even a simple toothache could have grave consequences if left untreated, so please see a professional immediately!