Treatment

Tooth extraction

Taking a tooth out is the last answer, not the quick one. It is the right answer when the tooth is beyond saving, when it is taking the bone around it down with it, or when it is in the way of the teeth that are staying.

Appointment: 20–60 minutes
Anaesthetic: Local or sedation
Soft food: 3–7 days
Socket healed: 2–4 weeks

What it is

A tooth is removed when keeping it would cost more than losing it: decay that has taken the tooth past restoring, gum disease that has loosened it in the bone, a fracture below the gum line, an impacted wisdom tooth pressing on its neighbour, or a crowded arch that has to make room before braces can work.

Everything before that list is an attempt not to be on it. A root canal saves a tooth whose nerve has died; a crown holds together one that has cracked. Extraction is where those have run out — and the conversation that matters afterwards is what fills the gap, because a space left alone lets the teeth beside it tilt and the bone beneath it recede.

The aim is to keep the tooth. When it cannot be kept, the aim is to take it out cleanly and to have already decided what goes in its place.
Dr. Aykut

Which one you need

Simple extraction
Loosened and lifted out under local anaesthetic, without cutting. Twenty minutes, and most extractions are this one.
A tooth fully through the gum
Surgical extraction
A small incision, and sometimes the tooth divided into pieces so it comes out without taking bone with it. Stitches, and a longer settling period.
A tooth broken at the gum, or below it
Wisdom teeth
The one people arrive worried about. Position decides everything: an upright wisdom tooth is a simple extraction, one lying against the tooth in front is a surgical one, and the scan is what tells you which you have.
Impacted, or coming in sideways
Full-arch clearance
Done under sedation, in one visit, and planned together with what replaces it — usually an implant-carried arch, so the day ends with teeth rather than without them.
A mouth beyond individual treatment
Emergency removal
The infection is controlled and the tooth dealt with the same day. Where the tooth can still be saved, an emergency root canal does that instead.
Pain or swelling that cannot wait

What happens to you

Two visits, and a wait at home in between

Before
The scan, and the alternative
An X-ray or CBCT to see the roots and what is around them — and a straight answer about whether the tooth can be kept. If it can, that is the treatment you are offered.
The appointment
The extraction
Local anaesthetic, or sedation for a longer or more anxious case. You feel pressure and movement rather than pain; the sensation people remember is the sound.
The first 24 hours
The clot
A blood clot forms in the socket and everything afterwards depends on it staying there. No rinsing, no smoking, no straws — the pressure lifts the clot out, and what follows is a dry socket, which genuinely hurts.
Days 2–7
Settling
Swelling peaks around the second or third day and eases from there. Soft food, cold rather than hot, and chew on the other side.
Weeks 2–4
What replaces it
The gum closes over in a fortnight; the bone underneath takes months. An implant is sometimes placed at the time of extraction and sometimes after healing — and the decision belongs at the start, not once the gap has settled.

Before
The scan, and the alternative
An X-ray or CBCT to see the roots and what is around them — and a straight answer about whether the tooth can be kept. If it can, that is the treatment you are offered.
The appointment
The extraction
Local anaesthetic, or sedation for a longer or more anxious case. You feel pressure and movement rather than pain; the sensation people remember is the sound.
The first 24 hours
The clot
A blood clot forms in the socket and everything afterwards depends on it staying there. No rinsing, no smoking, no straws — the pressure lifts the clot out, and what follows is a dry socket, which genuinely hurts.
Days 2–7
Settling
Swelling peaks around the second or third day and eases from there. Soft food, cold rather than hot, and chew on the other side.
Weeks 2–4
What replaces it
The gum closes over in a fortnight; the bone underneath takes months. An implant is sometimes placed at the time of extraction and sometimes after healing — and the decision belongs at the start, not once the gap has settled.

Before
The scan, and the alternative
An X-ray or CBCT to see the roots and what is around them — and a straight answer about whether the tooth can be kept. If it can, that is the treatment you are offered.
The appointment
The extraction
Local anaesthetic, or sedation for a longer or more anxious case. You feel pressure and movement rather than pain; the sensation people remember is the sound.
The first 24 hours
The clot
A blood clot forms in the socket and everything afterwards depends on it staying there. No rinsing, no smoking, no straws — the pressure lifts the clot out, and what follows is a dry socket, which genuinely hurts.
Days 2–7
Settling
Swelling peaks around the second or third day and eases from there. Soft food, cold rather than hot, and chew on the other side.
Weeks 2–4
What replaces it
The gum closes over in a fortnight; the bone underneath takes months. An implant is sometimes placed at the time of extraction and sometimes after healing — and the decision belongs at the start, not once the gap has settled.

Before
The scan, and the alternative
An X-ray or CBCT to see the roots and what is around them — and a straight answer about whether the tooth can be kept. If it can, that is the treatment you are offered.
The appointment
The extraction
Local anaesthetic, or sedation for a longer or more anxious case. You feel pressure and movement rather than pain; the sensation people remember is the sound.
The first 24 hours
The clot
A blood clot forms in the socket and everything afterwards depends on it staying there. No rinsing, no smoking, no straws — the pressure lifts the clot out, and what follows is a dry socket, which genuinely hurts.
Days 2–7
Settling
Swelling peaks around the second or third day and eases from there. Soft food, cold rather than hot, and chew on the other side.
Weeks 2–4
What replaces it
The gum closes over in a fortnight; the bone underneath takes months. An implant is sometimes placed at the time of extraction and sometimes after healing — and the decision belongs at the start, not once the gap has settled.

Questions

Does it hurt?

Not during — the area is fully numb and what you feel is pressure. Afterwards it is sore for a few days, and manageable with ordinary painkillers. The exception is a dry socket, which is a lost clot and needs to be seen.

What is a dry socket?

The clot in the socket coming away before the gum has healed over, leaving bone exposed. It typically arrives three or four days in as a deep ache, and it is why the first-day rules about smoking, straws and rinsing exist.

When can I fly?

Usually the day after a simple extraction and after two or three days for a surgical one. Tell us your flight before the appointment, not after — it changes what we do and when.

Do I have to replace the tooth?

A back molar sometimes needs nothing. Anywhere else, the gap lets the neighbouring teeth tilt into it and the opposing tooth drift down, and the bone under it recedes — so the sensible time to plan the implant or bridge is before the extraction, not after.

Should the wisdom teeth come out just in case?

Not automatically. A wisdom tooth that is upright, cleanable and causing nothing can be left alone. What justifies removal is pain, infection, decay it has caused in the tooth in front, or a position that makes it a problem waiting to happen.

Patients

The people who already came

Six of our patients, filmed at the clinic and talking about their own treatment. They are the clinic’s patients rather than any one procedure’s — what each of them had is in the film.