smoking cigarettes and tooth extraction?

Question

why are you not allowed to smoke after a tooth extraction? has anyone smoked after having a tooth pulled out?

Answer 1

I disagree. it has nothing to do with smoke getting on your socket or cooking your gums or suction. or the dentist would just say suck lightly or smoke through your nose and drink lots of water.

It has to do with how your body heals it self.

Smoking is bad because it contains nicotine. Nicotine is a chemical that passes into your bloodstream through your lungs when you smoke. Thats how it gets to your brain to make you feel good.

Your body heals wounds by sending healing cells that kill bacteria and repair stuff, through your arteries and veins. So the only way you can heal is if you have a good blood supply to the wound area.

The nicotine in your blood makes your blood vessels tighten (constrict), which means it makes you bleed less. you will have less blood flowing to the wound.

It is important that a blood clot forms in your socket when your tooth is taken out coz it starts the healing stops food from getting in and bacteria growing. If you arn't bleeding much you won't get a blood clot.

If you have a bad blood supply to the wound (because nicotine slows it down in your jaw by making little veins smaller) then your body can't send bob the builder cells through your blood to fix your socket...

The other thing the nicotine does is it gets inside these bob the builder cells and they don't work as well so you're drugging up your poor little bobs and they can't fix very good.

So because of that the chances are you will get an infection and be in pain :)

I hope that is not too in depth to understand.

as a side note, your mouth may get dry coz the nicotine stops your salivary glands getting enough blood supply so they slow down. This is great news for bacteria that want to grow as the previous poster has said.


Some people still smoke after they get extractions but they have a higher chance of getting a dry socket which is blimmen sore. Its fairly common to get it if you do but it doesn't always happen. I don't really care, as long as i don't have to breath your 2nd hand smoke and as long as my taxes don't pay for your hospital bill to replace your lungs feet brain tongue etc, then smoke away. Its your pain after all.

Answer 2

Smoking After Tooth Extraction

Answer 3

Yes, I smoked after having an extraction. Got a dry socket too. It hurt so bad that I swore I would quit smoking if the pain would stop. It has now been over a week, packed three times, and still painful. The next step is to scrap the area to start another clot again since it still won't heal. Smoking can dislodge or dissolve the clot. It also decreases blood flow to the area. The area needs the blood flow to heal. I have since quit smoking and if I could do it all over again, I would have stopped that first day.

Answer 4

It can slow healing and may dislodge the clot. This was explained well in another answer so I won't go into detail. If you absolutely have to smoke afterward, take long slow drags on the cigarette. This will help reduce the vacuum effect on the clots. ps. Quit smoking! You're too young to start down that road. After a few years, you smoke just to not feel the withdrawal effects. You feel crappy unless you are smoking and need a cigarette just to feel normal like someone who doesn't smoke in the first place.

Answer 5

The suction from taking a drag off your smoke may cause the blood clot that has formed on the extraction site to come loose. You can smoke at your own risk by putting some gauze over the extraction site and taking very light drags.

Answer 6

I believe it is because you create suction to pull teh smoke in from the cigarette which will also tend to draw blood up from the wound. I've smoked shortly after an extraction and that is what happened to me. It started bleeding again and took several hours to stop.

Answer 7

I agree with Molar!! The sucking action can dislodge the clot causing a dry socket, which will hurt so bad you will feel on the verge of death..........but more importantly smoking hampers the healing process.......did you hear the story about the first face transplant case in England?? They were so upset b/c after performing this amazing surgery on her, she started smoking which was devastating to her recovery and healing process!!!

Answer 8

Smoking drys your mouth out. Salavia helps to keep your teeth clean and helps in the healing process. Start saving about $1,000. You're going to need dentures if you keep smoking. Dentures aren't so bad. They last about 5 years and you have to get new ones. Avoid popcorn or you'll break the dentures.

Answer 9

had four wisdom teeth and another one yanked in one go, went straight outside and sparked up.

I was fine. I have never had dry socket.

But I do know we shouldn't smoke because we need the blood clot to form and we don't want to dislodge it either.

Answer 10

the Heat from the Smoke causes Dry Socket, that is very painful and can lead to a infection in the gums and make things worse leading to more teeth being pulled, or worse having an abcess in ur jaw, which is just plain out nasty..