Question:
I posted before about some irritations in my gums after getting prepped for
a crown.
I took the temporary off for a few days because of the irritation and when
the gums started to feel better I put it back on.
I have been wearing it now for about 3 days. I am still experiencing minor
irritation from the temp at this point. I am concerned because although I've
had about 5 crowns put on before this, only one of them irritated me like
this. The one that irritated me in the past was a permanent one that
eventually had to be replaced to stop the irritation. After it was replaced
with a higher quality crown, I no longer eperienced the
irritation/inflamation. I never knew why I had irritation with the original
one in the first place. Was it likely that I was having a reaction to the
lower quality metal in the original crown? Or could it have been the seating
of the crown?
Answer:
Only your dentist could tell you for sure, but it could possibly have
been the cheap "non-precious" metal irritating your gums. Next time, tell
the dentist you want "high-noble" metal. It will cost you a bit more
(depending on your dentist's markup and the size of the crown) but is less
likely to cause gum problems.
Does cheap jewelry bother your skin? If so, does it seem reasonable to
assume that your gums could possibly share the same metal sensitivities as
the rest of your body?
The new crown I think is going to be silver and gold amalgam. Not sure if
that constitutes high noble or not. I think it's the next step up then the
lowest quality one available.
Regarding the other one that irritated me (that I had replaced), the dentist
never reached a conclusion on what was causing the irritation. He suggested
doing an allergy test that was going to cost upwards of $600 to see if I was
allergic to it. I got a second opinion, and the second doctor thought the
allergy test was ridiculous. So I opted against the allergy test. I told him
to simply replace the old crown with a new one made of the same material as
the others he had done that were not bothering me (he did not do the one
that was irritating me). The problem went away.
