“…so because the insides of the roots of your tooth are infected, you need to have root canal treatment if you want to try to retain the tooth,” I say.

“Uh huh.”

“The success of treatment in your case is 85 to 90%.”

“I see.”

“The alternative is to extract the tooth.”

His eyes seem to light up, “I should talk to my dentist about that?”

“Yeah, if that’s an option that you need more information about.”

He pauses for a moment, “My naturopath said that if I need a root canal, I should have the tooth extracted instead. What’s your take on that?”

This time I pause for a moment, “If I sat down with your naturopath and discussed your root canal situation, we would never agree. Naturopaths base their conception about root canals on decades-old information that is now out of date.”

He’s paying attention.

I continue, “They feel that every tooth that has a root canal maintains a high level of bacterial content. These bacteria escape the tooth and travel to other parts of the body and cause problems there.”

He starts nodding slowly.

“But if you think about the fact that your tooth is already infected and the signs of infection are localized to the area surrounding the tooth and don’t appear to have caused a problem in your leg or anywhere else, why should a tooth that has a failed root canal treatment be any different. In any case, the degree of sepsis within teeth after properly done endodontic treatment is not what your naturopath would have you believe. You do need to remember that those odds of success I gave you account for relapse, and the odds are pretty good for a positive outcome,” I say.

He nods faster, “And I suppose that if root canals didn’t work, you wouldn’t be in business.”

Fuckin’ ignorance, I’m thinking about the naturopath.

“That’s exactly right. Anyway, I’m not going to argue with your naturopath’s recommendations. You need to trust one of us more than the other, and that will help you to decide how you want to go.”

And so he leaves the office to think about things for a bit…