The Hygienist Pulled My Filling Out.

Posted Nov 16, 2021

Every so often, we will have a patient that is receiving a dental cleaning and a filling or crown will come loose or fall out.  Sometimes, the patient believes it is the fault of the hygienist doing the cleaning.  The hygienist was either being too rough or not cleaning properly or somehow it was the fault of the dental office to have caused this.  Let’s put this idea to rest.

All dental work (and natural teeth, for that matter) should withstand a professional dental cleaning.  If a crown or filling comes loose during a cleaning visit, it needs to be redone or recemented.  It was faulty prior to the appointment.  It is impossible for dental cleaning instruments to pull out properly done fillings and crowns.  You need not worry that a professional cleaning will harm your dentistry.

Usually, the only thing keeping a bad filling in place is that it’s wedged between the teeth.  During the cleaning, the loose/broken/decayed filling becomes free.  And in the situation of a crown coming loose, the cement is no longer serving its purpose and the crown needs to be recemented with new cement.

If your filling or crown comes out during a dental cleaning, I can’t think of a more opportune time for it to happen.  The hygienist and dentist are right there to address it.  So if this happens to you in the future, be thankful it happened in the dental office and not while on vacation.