Insanity Descent

Post-Op Care: Wisdom Teeth Removal

I am not a medical professional in any way- I'm just a high school student who thinks his post-op instructions weren't thorough enough, so he's posting this to hopefully help at least one other person. If you are given other instructions from your dentist/surgeon, follow the instructions they gave you and not the ones here. I'm going to attempt to give advice for surgery with local anesthesia, but I was given general anesthesia {as well as local for temporary post-op pain relief} so I cannot speak much for local anesthesia operations.

The times listed here are assuming that 0 days, 0 hours, and 0 minutes represents the time during your surgery {so technically 0 days, 0 hours, and 0 minutes is actually a time period of about 30-45 minutes}. Negative numbers mean it takes place before your surgery {ex. -2 hours means 2 hours before your surgery} and positive numbers mean it takes place after your surgery {ex. 1 day means 24-48 hours have passed after your surgery}.

This post also assumes you know the difference between general and local anesthesia and that you know some other vocabulary. Your pal Google can help you out if you don't know your terms.

~×~×~×~

-1 DAYS:

Make sure you eat a lot of food! You will not be able to eat for several hours after your surgery {and if you're getting general anesthesia, several hours before too}, so it's in your best interest to eat a lot. Be sure to also hydrate yourself a lot too because you also won't be able to drink any water for a while. I had a personal experience where my throat felt dry but it was too late because I reached the time period before my surgery that I wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything, so I had to wait until the next day after my surgery just to drink some water. Don't follow in my footsteps, eat lots of food and drink lots of water.

Also, be sure to brush your teeth REALLY well, especially if you're getting general anesthesia. You won't even be able to brush your teeth before your surgery if you're getting general anesthesia because of the possibility you'll accidentally swallow water, and you won't be able to brush your teeth for about 2-3 days after your surgery {and at that point, you won't be able to brush very far back}. Make your mouth feel so clean it feels like it got cleaned by your own dentist! If you have the tools to do it, scrape off as much build up as you can too. I personally didn't scrape off any build up despite the fact I have the proper tools to do it, and I regretted it. You will get build up, and if you have even the smallest bit of build up already there it's going to make it that much harder to remove. I'm lucky that I was able to remove some of it with a toothbrush alone.

-10 HOURS

Ignore this step if you're getting local anesthesia. I believe the official recommendation is at least 8 hours before your surgery, but my instructions were 10 hours before. Either way, your dentist/surgeon should give you a time before your surgery that you should not eat or drink ANYTHING. This is because the contents of your stomach may very well be vomited up once you are given general anesthesia, and you may choke on your vomit. This could actually lead to death- it's how some drug users die.

I know I said it in the -1 days step, but I'll put it here again that the no eating/drinking order extends to brushing your teeth. I didn't know I wasn't supposed to brush my teeth the morning of {but I guess it's also my fault for not using common sense} until I was in the waiting room waiting to be seen for my surgery, so you can imagine the sheer horror I felt when I found out I wasn't supposed to brush, especially because I couldn't back out at that point. The next opening for getting wisdom teeth pulled was almost 2 months later and my dad and I had already woken up at 4 AM so we could be there at 6 AM {it was the only available time left}, so I wasn't going to back out. Don't put yourself in my situation!

0 MINUTES - 10 MINUTES

When it's actually time for your surgery, there's gonna be a lot of scary stuff going on. I don't know what surgery looks like under local anesthesia other than you often get multiple injections of Novocaine and you're awake the entire time, so I can't say much else other than sit back and don't get in your dentist's/surgeon's way.