It’s never a good idea to wait too long to receive any dental treatment. When a concern develops with your healthy, natural tooth structure and/or oral tissues, it’s likely to get worse over time, until you actively stop it by having it treated. Cavities, which are the most frequent concern for patients of all ages, pose the same problem, and they can become more severe faster than patients often realize. While you may be able to treat a cavity in its mild to moderate stages with a convenient tooth filling, it may require more extensive treatment to resolve if you wait to long to receive the filling.

The reason your tooth needs a filling

Tooth fillings are designed to treat cavities, which develop in a tooth when it starts to decay. This decay is an infection in the tooth’s structure caused by certain harmful types of oral bacteria, and it’s a progressive condition that grows increasingly worse over time. The point of filling a cavity is to clean away the bacteria that have infected the tooth, as well as any infected tooth structure, then filling the space with a biocompatible material to restore the tooth’s strength and integrity. The cavity results from the erosion of your tooth’s natural structure, and restoring this structure is essential to restoring and preserving your tooth.

The point of the treatment process

When you treat a tooth for tooth decay, the point of the treatment process is largely to stop the decay from progressing any further. This will help you preserve the remaining healthy, natural tooth structure and protect it from becoming decayed. The treatment also serves to restore the tooth’s strength and integrity after it’s lost some of its structure to the decay. Any loss of a tooth’s structure can cause it to grow weaker, making it more likely to suffer more damage from bite pressure.

The result of waiting in severe cases

When you treat a cavity as early as possible, you can stop the decay while it’s still in its mild or moderate stages. The more moderate extent of the tooth infection means that your dentist can successfully treat and restore the tooth with minimally invasive treatment, such as cleaning and filling the cavity. However, it may not take long for tooth decay to become more severe if you hesitate to treat it early, and severe tooth decay involves the infection of much more than just your tooth’s main structure. For more extensive cases of tooth decay, you might require root canal treatment to save the tooth.

Learn how a filling can save your tooth

If your tooth needs a filling, then waiting too long to treat it could lead to more severe decay within the tooth’s structure. To learn more, schedule a consultation by calling Modern Smile in North Hollywood, CA, today at 818-763-9353. We also proudly serve patients who live in Burbank, Toluca Lake, and all surrounding communities.