I’m calling the dentist in the morning for real advice, but it’s five in the morning and it hurts now? What’s the best thing to put on it/take so I can get some sleep tonight?
If you have it, clove oil.
If not, the best you can hope for without a 24 hour pharmacy close by is an Advil/Tylenol mix. Don’t overmedicate yourself like I did when I had a bad toothache years ago. That was scary.
Of all the usual pain meds, ibuprofen should work best for a toothache.
When nothing would work for a weekend wisdom tooth toothache I had, the chemist (pharmacist) recommended a treatment for period pain that contained ibuprofen and it worked until the Monday.
Antibiotics.
OK I have had experience with this. This is what they do if you go to the Emergency Room.
They tell you to take 800mg of ibuprofen every six hours (that’s a prescription dose). and then 1000 mg of acetaminophen every six hours in intervals
So in otherwords at
1pm you take 800mg of ibuprofren
4pm you take 1000mg of acetaminophen
7pm you take another 800mg of ibuprofen
10pm you take another 1000mg of acetominophen
1am you take another 800 mg of ibuprofen
4am you take another 1000mg of acetominophen
And so forth
Of course if you have stomach issues you’re going to have to reduce the ibuprofen or not take it. If you have more than 2 drinks a day half the dose of acetominophen
That’ll get you till you see a dentist. Obviously I’m not a doctor but when I’ve had tooth aches, this is what the ER doctors told me to do.
Actually if you live in Chicago, Oak Forest Hospital in sububan Oak Forest does emergency dental extractions. They won’t fix the tooth but they’ll pull it. Oak Forest Hospital is the long term public hospital for Cook County. So just look them up on the web for details
Not really. Only if the cause of the pain is infection, and even then, it won’t have any primary pain-relieving effects, and may take days to reduce the infection enough to lower the pain.
Marxxx has a good protocol
What Markxxx posted is about what my dentist told me to do when I had an abscessed wisdom tooth. I don’t remember the acetaminophen part, (this was years ago), but he told me to take 4 Advil every 6 hours. Dental pain is pure torture. Advil saved my sanity that time.
Depends on the source of the pain. I have bad back teeth. I should see a dentist but I’m poor and uninsured so it’s not likely to happen.
I’ve found treatment for pain depends on whether it’s an exposed nerve or infection.
For infection: Ibuprofen (if it’s just for a few days you can take more. I was prescribed 800 mg for stitches once so I know four is safe for short term use, and works far better than two.
Soaking my mouth in hydrogen peroxide. It’s foul but it helps with swelling and pain. If you can get ahold of antibiotics that’s great but I have treated many infections with hydrogen peroxide alone. Prepare for the sensation of skunk in your mouth. Have some mouthwash to rinse with. It’s worth it.
For exposed nerve, Den-tek sells an “emergency dental kit” with temporary filling material. If you can’t get to it, one of those Anbesol type products. If you can’t get that (and I’ve recently been in this position) take a swig of your favorite booze and hold it in your mouth where it hurts until the skin in your mouth starts stinging. Your choice whether you swallow or not. It takes away the pain for me almost immediately and works for several hours. No amount of Ibuprofen helped me with the exposed nerve pain. Maybe took the edge off of that jaw-grinding feeling, but not much.
I recently read a recommendation for chewing cashews. The nut is soft enough to seal the exposed break and stays in for a while and the oil is supposedly good for something. I haven’t tried that yet but if it helps, it’s worth it.
It’s pathetic that I know so much about this.
I’m in this same situation, over the holiday NO ONE was open, but I paged my primary care doc and got some pain meds (tramadol, practically useless) and some antibiotics until I can be seen.
I’d sleep with that side of my face on a hot water bottle. It’s what I do when I have a headache. It’s still there but it feels somewhat better.
Now, I was told to use COLD (ice in a washcloth or some such) to press against an aching tooth. Or press very hard, for 5 minutes, or rub an ice cube hard on the web of flesh on your hand between the thumb and forefinger. This disrupts the pain current running along the nerves. And don’t try to sleep lying down flat, sleep propped up. It has to do with difference in blood pressure.
Good cautions there, but acetaminophen poisoning can be very bad. I suggest anyone taking that much Tylenol read this carefully, and consult at least the advice nurse.
The last 2 times I had an infection ibuprofen worked OK but it was antibiotics that did the trick after 2 days. For both of them I ended up with a root canal.
If you have green tea bags, making a compress of a damp teabag can help a bit, along with some Aleve. It took the edge off for me when I had an abscess that couldn’t be tended to right away.
Note, though, that Ibuprofen is rather slow to take effect – it can be about two hours from the time you take it until the pain starts to subside. If the OP took it quickly enough, it should be feeling better by now.
This thread was started more than four years ago, so I certainly hope the OP is feeling better by now.
God, I hope so. Otherwise, the OP has been in pain for over four years.
Say, is that a commercial link in the reviving post? Maybe it’s benign and I’m just paranoid, but I’m a bit afraid to click.
I reported it, just in case. Surfing on my phone, with limited internet access, so I’m not even trying to check the links myself…
Only way to really get rid of the pain is time. Large quantities of OTC painkillers help in the short term, but it’s not going away until it goes away.