Usually when you feel sudden and intense pain in your mouth, you would immediately suspect a tooth abscess. But sometimes an abscess can develop very slowly without causing any pain or extreme swelling. So how can someone detect the beginning of a tooth abscess before it becomes intensely painful?

A dental abscess is a bacterial infection that originates from either a tooth, or the gums that surround a tooth. It can be so small and barely detectable on an x-ray, or it might grow very big, causing swelling that might completely distort someone’s face.

Whether there is pain or not does not necessarily depend on the size of the abscess. Pain comes from acute infections, which means infections that develop quickly. Chronic abscesses (slow infection) may grow in size for months and cause very little pain.

Here are the main symptoms that can help you become aware of having a dental abscess:

  • Your gums might become red and puffy, with swelling around the infected tooth.
  • Chewing on food can be a hard task because the abscessed tooth becomes painful when it touches food or opposing teeth.
  • An abscess, which is an infection, can cause fever leading to general fatigue and even headaches.
  • If swelling occurs, the pus might come out by itself and flow into your mouth. The pus’ taste is very bad, and it’s recommended to spit out the pus instead of swallowing it. There’s usually less pain after this happens.

The information above should be used as a reference only. Any medical decision should not be taken before consulting a health care professional.

The masculine gender may have been more used in the article, but without prejudice, to make reading easier.

Category: questions and answers

Print Friendly, PDF & Email