Dental cavities are nasty business, and nobody wants to be walking around with an infected tooth. Cavity pain is excruciating, irritating and cavities could cause further damage to your mouth and gums.

Clear Advantage Dental & Orthodontic Clinic offers Vancouver professional tooth fillings to help treat cavities and protect your teeth. Visiting our office for regular checkups is important because cavities generally don’t cause significant pain until they begin to run deep. We can still heal severe cavities but also have the expertise to spot cavities in their beginning stages. When a cavity is detected in its early stage, Clear Advantage in Vancouver can often treat a cavity using our specially designed lasers, without the need for drills or anesthesia.

What is a cavity?

Dental caries, more commonly known as dental cavities, is tooth decay caused by bacteria. When bacteria, usually from sugars and other unhealthy foods and drinks, builds-up in the mouth as plaque, it breaks-down the hard tissues of a tooth over time, gradually creating a cavity. As a cavity develops, it begins to become more noticeable and causes the affected part of the tooth to die.

The best preventative measures of a cavity include regular teeth cleaning and visits to a dentist.

What do cavities look like?

Cavities can sometimes be hard to spot in their early stages, which is why regular visits to a dentist are so important. However, in their later stages, they often range in colour from yellow to brown and black. Small cracks and holes in the affected area of a tooth cavity are also not unusual.

What are the symptoms of a cavity?

Common cavity symptoms include gum swelling, bad breath, toothache, pain and discomfort in eating and talking. Less commonly, cavities can infect other teeth and cause severe gum infections; in untreated cases and under rare circumstances, cavity infections can spread across a mouth and possibly become life-threatening.

How do you heal cavities?

Dentists treat teeth cavities by removing the decayed part of the tooth. For shallow cavities caught early with a regular dental visit, this process can be done relatively pain-free with the use of a laser, not requiring the use of needles or drills. Dentists then “fill in” the newly created gap in the tooth with a tooth filling, sometimes known as a dental filling.

What is a tooth filling?

A tooth filling is a piece of material dentists use to restore a part of a tooth affected by a tooth cavity. After cleaning the hole or gap in a tooth, dentists insert the filling, which also helps to prevent future tooth decay by closing up the empty space of a tooth.

Common types of fillings include gold, silver, composite plastic or porcelain, each with their own colours and structural benefits. The dental professionals at Clear Advantage Dental & Orthodontic Clinic can discuss which option is best for you!

What happens after I get a filling?

Fillings are commonly applied in layers so that way they fit the shape and appearance of the original tooth. The tooth filling should feel smooth over the tongue and soon will become a natural feeling in your mouth.

Almost all types of tooth fillings are designed to be permanent and can last for many years.

If you required a drill and anesthesia because of a deep-rooted tooth cavity, numbness may last for a couple of hours after the procedure.