Who knew that choices made when I was a teenager would have such far-reaching effects?
Back story: a bit of a tooth disappeared while I was eating a lovely meal that our helper prepared. On a bank holiday Friday, so no chance of anything until this week. Thankfully there was and is no pain, just a rough hole on the inside of my lower right first molar (4-6 if you care). I thought it was filling falling out, but my dentist assures me otherwise.
Mercury amalgam is known to crack teeth. and there is some debate about whether it should still be used at all (obviously the debate has changed in the 20+ years since I had mine done).
Thinking about it, putting a heat sensitive expanding and contracting piston inside a tooth doesn’t sound like the most sensible idea mankind has ever had. So I have a few more teeth that are cracked by the amalgam and could go at any time.
My German dentist relates it partly to historical technology and partly to capitation payments for UK dental care in the 80s (we had more work done than most other countries at the time to game the payment system). Respect to her multi-culturality for knowing this and b) respect to a great bedside manner: “surprisingly good teeth for a Brit”, “that one, that one and that one will fall apart next”.
All that said, it isn’t super urgent so we are going to fix it after we’ve all got back from summer vacation. Hey ho.
Exploding teeth does not seem to be a problem here. Could it be due to a cooler climate or, alternatively, as you are in and out of air conditioning does rapid temperature change have an effect. On the other hand you would expect the mouth temperature to be fairly constant making any external temperature changes an unlikely cause. Hot tea, ice cream or just bad dentistry are possibilities. I go with the third.
I’m with bad dentistry too. I think it is internal temperatures that make the most difference (near boiling tea to iced drinks, for example). However, it is possible that the faster and more regular oscillation between 33 Celsius outside and 20 Celsius inside may also have an effect.
Exploding might be a little excessive a description of it as well. A reasonably sized piece flaked off is probably more accurate.
Lance’s back molar exploded two weeks ago – and he is from the land of terrifying large, uniform, white teeth. I think it was the same problem, old amalgam fillings. I had mine removed about 6 years ago (amalgams, not teeth), so had the comment ‘quite good teeth for a Brit’ only last week by my Kiwi dentist. Parallel lives.
Oh dear. The perils of age. And old technology. Hope Lance is OK.