Dentists Describe The Most Horrific Things They've Found In Patients' Mouths
Nobody loves the dentist. All of the machines in the procedure room are scary, that music they play in the waiting room is incredibly generic, and worst of all you never know if you're going to be receiving good news or bad. Dentists rarely pull punches, either, and they've been known to figure in more than a few hygiene-related horror stories. If you haven't been flossing, your dentist will know and call you out for it. They're not like those nice doctors you see on TV â they're merciless and unyielding.
Of course, dentists don't have it so easy, either. They've got to deal with squirmy kids and patients who never brush their tongues. In fact, dentists have seen some of the most horrific types of matter in their patients' mouths. You didn't think living organisms could sprout in someone's oral cavity? Well, they certainly can and do. The dentists of Reddit have shared their grisly stories, so read on â but maybe keep a bottle of mouthwash handy.
- 110,331 VOTES
The Secret Cyst-Dweller
From Redditor /u/ackfjre:
"One day a mom came in with her son... They bring the son back who [had] been complaining about his gums hurting extremely bad. Thought it was an infection or really bad sore, and wanted to get it checked.
Inside his mouth was a... disgusting cyst. One of those nasty pulsing ones that you see in an alien movie when the protagonist gets onto the mothership and finds the incubation room.
Anyway, so after some discussion they decide to do the procedure in a semi normal way: numb the kid up, ahem de-inflate the cyst, then remove it. Easy as can be. Sorta.
[So the kid is numbed and prepped] for an incision. [When the cyst is opened], out crawls a larvae thing from this cyst it had been living in."
- 27,378 VOTES
Mouths And Bugs Don't Mix
From Redditor /u/WhatShouldIDoNoSleep:
"[The dentist at my mom's office] was working on a patient who rarely came to the office, as in, they'd probably see her once every few years.
I'm not even going to go into the details, but a live bug flew out of a socket in her gum, where a tooth had rotted out. A living bug. Why."
- 36,739 VOTES
A Gigantic Booger
From Redditor /u/endo_ag:
"I was in dental school doing a hospital rotation. We were asked to do a dental exam on an unconscious man who had been found unconscious while high on heroin. He was going to recover, but was sedated. He was septic with a bacteria commonly found orally, (Strep veridans, perhaps). On exam we saw some very poor quality... dentistry... but there was also a thick white crust covering his extremely dry mouth and tongue.
We debated what it might be, with one guess being a severe Candida overgrowth. We cultured it and found no fungal growth under the microscope. He was brought to the dental clinic for debridement. When he came to our clinic and water was sprayed trying to clean him up, it became clear what it was. He had sinus drainage into his mouth that had dried and he essentially had a quarter inch thick layer of booger covering his mouth and throat."
- 44,536 VOTES
Digging For Decay
From Redditor /u/Idontevenlikefish:
"I had a patient whose insides of his mouth was covered in layers of multicolored calculus. Black, green and red. I had to ultrasonic scale each individual tooth for a good few minutes, unearthing layers upon layers of mineralized crap. The stench was also horrendous.
At that point I wondered if I was a dentist or an archeologist."
- 54,793 VOTES
Dentures Can Mold, Too
From Redditor /u/Poke-hey-mon:
"My dad's a dentist. He pulled out a patient's dentures and they were covered in mold. Yep, the patient was wearing moldy dentures... I would assume anybody that takes care of their mouth in such a terrible way takes care of the rest of their body in a similar manner."
- 65,607 VOTES
It's Gonna Blow!
From Redditor /u/judyduty:
"I dated a dentist. He was telling me about a patient that had an abscess so large that when he lanced it, there was like a volcano eruption of pus coming out of his mouth."