I was begging for a root canal w/ my first TN flare - the way they determined if I needed one was to see if the tooth (or any of the teeth in the area) were sensitive to heat and cold. If you could feel the hot/cold sensation in your tooth, the root is okay. As far as the infection, do you have a fever? An antibiotic should help if that's what it is...

I don't know anything about methadone, but neither Percoset or Vicodin even touched my TN pain, while both Tegretol and Neurontin did the trick. As anti-convulsants, they addressed the nerve misfiring. Pre-diagnosis, I also found several glasses of wine helped but that might not be the best advice. Hope this helps some - take care! Diane

well severeal teeth hurt to tuch, but one in paticular and my gums are bleeding like mad when I brush and kind gush on that area....so I kind of ruled out TN because of the other symptoms, no fever tho just pain and bleeding.
Morgaine

When you said bleeding gums, about ten years ago I was in a lot of pain, and gums used to swell and bleed every now and then. It was loss of tooth beneath the gum line, caused by improper cleaning. After scraping all that bad stuff, everynow and again I will get a piece of food caught in one of those places and the decaying food will cause the gums to bleed and swell and the teeth and the whole area to hurt really bad.

Hopefully yours could be so simple, but still would be no fun. If that were it, I would floss (yes it will hurt and bleed, but if food is in there, the relief will be enormous) or if you have a water pic.

morgaine... i dont know where you live...but here in ontairo canada alot of people who dont have medical coverage tend to use the dental schools... the last year students do dental work at a huge discount under direct supervision of their instructors who are themselves dentists....

good luck hope you feel better soon.

hugs
heather

If you can save up about $75 to see a dentist for just a cleaning and ask him to look at your tooth/teeth where it hurts. Most dentists will work with you on a payment plan once you are an established patient and after the initial visit has been payed for. Good Luck!

Hey Sweety, Dental School is a good idea, and contact your local health dept. Also, if you already have a dentist, call and tell them your situation. Last resort, check out www.carecredit.com DD

i had two teeth ( in the back of left side) pulled and it stopped my headache all the time... and they work with my payment plans.. it works good for me
dont take vidcion.... i got sick before i knew i had MS.. never a gain ! dentist tried to give me this and i told them HELL NO !
Hope this will help u

Morgaine,
I'm so sorry you are struggling with this now. IF it is infected, there are still old fashioned ways to work with infection. Peroxide or salt water compresses. Get your GP to give you a course of antibiotics on the basis that infection raises white blood cells and that is bad for MS. Tell you GP you will get to a dentist, but you need to save up the money. Maybe you'll need your neuro to give you the script. You do need to get the infection under control right away so it doesn't affect your MS. Floss those sore gums too. Even though it isn't for internal use, I've even put neosporin in my mouth - it doesn't taste good, but you can probably put it around the gums to help with the infection. Please keep in mind, I am NOT a medical expert - just another poor person with MS.

I'm in the middle of a TN flare and my doc. added dilantin. I took Tegretol before and it didn't help. Anybody got other ideas? Oh, I'm already taking 2400 mg of neurontin. I had to go to the dentist to have him confirm it was not a dental issue before the neuro would let me start solumedrol.

Also, Morgaine - I know here in Denver they have dentists that help low income people for free. Not sure about where you live.