blue gums with root canals

dufie

new to this so prob goin to make a mess of post. have 2 root canals on front teeth with a crown & veneer placed 13 yrs ago. need to get both replaced soon. show a lot of gum when smiling and gums have blue tinge to them. crown & veneer are all ceramic. can root canals be replaced with glass fibre posts, or should i not tempt fate. although am a year into orthodontics & root canals never caused problems. thanks.

davo10

The roots of root canal treated teeth can darken due to loss of vitality, if your gums have receeded slightly above ceramic restorations the root can become visible giving a blue/black shadow above crowns. Are you certain the restorations are ceramic and not bonded? (porcelain on outside metal on inside), if they are bonded sometimes the metal substructure can be visible at crown margins if gum receeds. Wait until ortho is finished and positions of teeth are finalised, then if teeth/bite are suitiable have crowns replaced with procera/lava crowns (best cosmetics and strength).

dufie

thanks davo10. def no metal. dentist had metal bonded one made first but when he tried to fit it, it was too bulky(crowding at bottom made this tooth stick out) so then had all ceramic one made. blue/dark area is not just at margin but all over area above veneer & crown. have read about glass fibre post & core, but not sure if its poss to have them placed now. braces due to come off in about 6 weeks. bit earlier than expected so have less time to find out this stuff.

btkm8unsl0w5r4

a problem I find is that the metalic discolouration has leached into the root of the tooth and there is no way if effectivly get rid of that without removing the root. Bleaching the root does not really work. Sometimes adding some thick gum over the area can help.

I often place all ceramic post and crown for this problem, but if the root itself is to blame then the problem is nigh on impossible to fix properly without removing the offending dark root.

georgieporgy

presumably he has a metal post/core right? And he is reasonably young. And we don't know just how black it really looks. Still worth a try with the glass fibre post I would say. Of course you have to remove the old post first and that is not without risk.
I suspect he would be happy with a marked improvement even if it were not perfect. And I agree you can't bleach the root.
Any chance of a photo Dufie? I think this thread is worth developing. We may get past the usual chatter about holidays in eastern europe.

dufie

metal post/core. late 30s. gums prob not that dark, but appear v.dark to me. will try & post ortho photo when i find out how to. if root has darkened will ceramic post make any difference? what's involved in removing root itself. want to get as good a job done now as possible. would hate to get new crown/veneers and for them to look like crowns/veneers. old ones don't look the best, but hope that after ortho, dentist won't be as restricted & hopefully labs/materials have moved on. thanks, all replies appreciated & will be grilling my own dentist when i get an apt.
just wondering, would you dentists have a prosthodontist crown front teeth?

georgieporgy

Removing the root means pulling out your tooth and throwing it away . You don't want that right? My guess is your original crowns were just so so. Now you have gone to great effort with ortho for a nice outcome. removing the metal post and redoing with glass fibre is your best shot. If as Fitzgeme says the root colour has been compromised well then tough luck. But I would expect a signifigant improvement.
Who would do the work? Ask your dentist if he can construct 'invisible' crowns. If he /she isn't comfortable with that, they can recommend a prostodontist ( or you can ask around). But you are in no hurry. get a photo up here. ask some teenager to help with that . Let's get a few more comments and try to have a good result . You'll be happy and we'll make some irish dentist rich. ( sorry- couldn't resist that:eek:):eek::eek:)