Wisdom Teeth

Some people have four, some people have more, and some people have less.  Some people never see their wisdom teeth and some never knew they even came in.  Others have them surgically extracted, and some live with them impacted.

I don't want to say that your wisdom teeth are not necessary, but patients have enough teeth that they could do without.  Most patients' wisdom teeth usually cause problems if they are not properly taken care of.  If you do have them they are very hard to keep clean because they are far back in the mouth.  Wisdom teeth are most likely to decay and develop gum disease.  The gum disease developed in the wisdom teeth can effect your other teeth.  Also, wisdom teeth can effect your other teeth if they do not grow in properly.  Patients that do not have them surgically extracted, and have been told to, could experience something like this,

Now, this x-ray shows the wisdom tooth (the tooth to the left) growing into the patients last molar (the tooth in the middle).  All of the black in the molar is decay from where the wisdom tooth was pushing into the molar.  The decay is causing infection in the molar, this is painful.  Unfortunately, not only did this person have to lose the wisdom tooth, but they also lost their molar. 

Moral of the story, if your dentist tells you to get your wisdom teeth out, use my wisdom, and get them out before you lose more teeth than necessary.