Tinnitus Spike Four Days After Dental Work?

Hi guys,

I had 2 fillings done last Friday, I didn't wear earplugs because the the vibration noise inside the skull from the occlusion effect was too much. Anyway all was fine afterwards, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday completely fine, it was only on Tuesday, 4 days after the drilling my ears started buzzing, from then on the past 3 days my T sounds aggravated, more intense?

It isn't helping that I've got one last filling to be done next Friday, but I'm not sure if the spike is connected to the dental work or not? My T is normally quite stable? Obviously I don't want to have more drilling if it is the cause of this spike.

Could dental drilling be the cause of this spike even though my T was fine for 4 days after? Sort of like a 4 day delay?

 

I definitely think the drilling has made my tinnitus worse! It is more pronounced around everyday noise, normally the TV masks it quite well but now I clearly hear buzzing/hissing/sizzling!

I've had to cancel the next filling I was due to have next week, I feel so annoyed I've got to deal with with louder crap now!

 

Mick1987, I had dental work on Monday and thought I made it through ok. Yesterday was one of the worst T days ever. Reading your post makes me wonder. Ironically the same thing you describe with sounds is mine too and in my head as well as ears. I am going back Friday since this was crown prep.
Don't wait too long on that other tooth could be worse if you wait.
So what are your thoughts drill or open mouth and head position?
Why a few days after?
Hang in there I feel your pain.

 

Hi @Leah I was fine for 4 days after the drilling, but the T reacting the way it is now it must have been the drill through bone conduction, my dentist drilled for 30 seconds at a time, from what I've read it should have been 5 seconds on, 10 seconds off etc, but she refused to do short bursts!

Ive had a permanent increase last year with a sudden loud noise, but there was a 1 day delay in the T changing tone and getting louder. This time its a longer delay of 3 or 4 days, its almost like a bruise taking time to show up?

It sucks because I've got an increase in T and haven't even sorted all my teeth out!

I hope this will go down again but I'm not holding my breath!

Hope things improve for you.

 

If it's from the noise then why not take plugs next time? It might seem strange to the dentist but who cares? Do what you've got to do.

It couldn't be from any painkillers could it? Or the increased stress of having your teeth done? Sometimes random spikes just happen, though the timing makes it seems like it was dentist related.

 

Did wear noise cancelling headphones. Just as Mick said noise is internal from bone conduction.
I would have lived with the removable partial if I would have known was so loud. Marcini I do wonder about the stress part.

 

The external noise wasn't even loud, if the dental work is responsible for this spike it must have been from the bone conduction.

I didn't take any painkillers afterwards (haven't in 2.5 years), a little bit of stress on the day but soon relaxed and forgot about the whole procedure for days afterwards.

If this spike is unrelated then it sure is a coincidence! But I hope your right because then I have some hope it will only been a temporary change.

 

You guys are scaring me lol.

I have dental work scheduled for this Tuesday. And after reading through the thread here on TT that's like 7 pages long it didn't seem like anyone had a problem.

Eek Idk what to do now :/

Edit: Can I ask what caused the Tinnitus for you @mick1987 and @Leah ? I was hoping since mine is most likely drug induced that the loud noise shouldn't make me more susceptible to increase in tinnitus as compared to a person who has it from noise exposure?

But I could be completely wrong on that count :/

 

@russiancarl My tinnitus is noise induced, I thinking now my tinnitus is more easily worsened then the norm......before T I had looked after my hearing, never even liked loud music, hated wearing earphones to listen to music so I never did.

Friday night august 2012 a faulty fire/smoke alarm was going off in my dads shed 3 o clock in the morning, Id been asleep for a few hours, when I woke up I was still drunk because I had a few beers a few hours before. As I went into the garden and opened the shed door I couldn't see a thing.......it was pitch black.....the shed was full of my dads tools.....and somewhere underneath all that junk was a blaring loud smoke alarm.

Because the shed was so full of tools I could only stand just in the shed doorway, just trying to find the alarm like a blind person waving his arms around in the dark....the noise was greatly amplified because all the space that was left was headspace, so its the equivalent to you sitting in a cupboard with a super loud fire alarm. As the alarm was going "BEEP, BEEP, BEEP,BEEP!" My eardrums were beating like two heartbeats each side of my head ready to explode!...I didn't even know what it was, I thought to myself "why is my head beating like heartbeats?" Lol, like I say I was still drunk so all common sense was out the window. I was in there for a good minute but after struggling to find the alarm I went back into the house to wake my dad up to look for the alarm because it was that loud was likely the whole street could hear it! My dad who also had a few too many beers that night goes "yeah.....you sort it out Mick!".... so stupidly I went back down to the shed.....eardrums beating like crazy again....I you know what I did so the neighbours wouldn't hear the alarm?.......I shut the shed door behind me!....so I'm stuck in a shed....complete darkness.....fucking tools and junk everywhere...... Eardrums bouncing up and down like a trampoline........ Trying to find the alarm with my hands.....dad comes down....opens the shed....with a TORCH! (Clever bastard lol)....looks at me and goes " what the fuck are you doing!?.......finds the smoke alarm on the floor straight away...takes the batteries out...no.more...awful..noise! it must have been 100 plus decibels.....Straight after my ears where extremely stuffy and I couldn't hear properly for about 3 or 4 days afterwards....temporary threshold shift, I said to my dad straight afterwards "oh no!...my ears are ringing!".... 2 and a half years later they still are, only louder! It was enough damage for my previously well looked after hearing to create this permanent tinnitus.

Then October 2013, I was helping my dad jump start his car, afterwards I slammed shut the car bonnet/hood, made a rather loud noise because I had dropped it too high up. I was worried about my T but it was seemingly fine afterwards. 6 hours later my ears go extremely stuffy full again (for a whole 5 days afterwards) it was a day after the loud noise my tinnitus went crazy! It went from a hissing noise to a roaring/gas oven type noise with ringing on top. Luckily the volume went down slightly but I was left with a permanent worsening from an everyday loud noise!

From then on I started wearing earplugs every time I leave the house to prevent it happening again. Now another 14 months pass and I'm at the dentists, 2 fillings done, fine afterwards, 4 days later and currently the noise is the same but its like someone has turned the volume up 30-50%!

I think the reason for my tinnitus keep getting worse is because the fire alarm/detector obliterated the tiny hairs in my inner ear!....it was a pretty traumatic acoustic trauma.

I bet you wish you'd never asked now!...

I've still got one filling to be done on Friday but with my T louder I'm going to have to cancel it or like a crazy person get it done so at least with my now louder tinnitus my teeth are OK.

Hopefully your T being drug induced you shouldn't get any problems like most who've had dental work.

 

Do not mean to scare anyone away from dental work.
In the past I have had root canals, extractions and implants with no problem. Crown prep was more challenging because of the bone conduction noise. Really no clue on cause of my T , just is.
If I had had not read Mick1987's post not sure if I would have connected it to the dental work. Could just be coincidence , I posted about a trip to Neurologust the day before my spike happened. Having unusual head pain maybe that is the cause. So hard to tell what causes these new changes. Please relax, protect your ears.
Sorry if these posts have made you more anxious.

 

@mick1987 Did you have mercury fillings? I have been reading a lot about how dangerous they are recently. I have 5 and suffer other health effects that it seems might be related. Mercury poisoning can cause tinnitus.

I want to get mine out, but now you are scaring me about this!

 

Had mine out many years ago.
Please dont let this stop you, we can't even be sure that it is from the dental work. Why would it take days to react?
Every dental procedure requires a different drill, mine had to take the tooth down much further than a filling. Please notice I had many dental visits with no problem at all.

 

Thanks @Leah, I am looking into where to have it done at the moment. It seems it will involve quite some travel to get it done safely. I can't believe they still put these things in people's mouths after what I have been reading.

 

I just went to the dentist , pretty annoying while it lasted . Got 3 quit days after that !?
Not connected , just saying, dont think it necessarily does any harm.?

 

@dboy no the fillings were composite resin white fillings, well I say white they're more of a blue colour!? Lol...i didn't think they did mercury fillings anymore because of the health problems they cause? I had 3 mercury fillings as a teen, now I have 2 because I had one tooth with the mercury filling extracted this year due to an infection.

I also didn't mean the scare anyone out of having dental work, 4 days without problems it seems like a long time and it's unrelated, it's just my tinnitus is usually very stable, it rarely fluctuates? Im just trying to look for answers and the obvious one is the dental work, even if it was a 4 day delay? Plus the fact I've got more dental work coming up I don't know what to do for the best?

Again, apologies if my post looks like scaremongering!...I feel guilty now!

 

@mick1987 no worries, we are here to share experiences and what you posted will help me ask questions to find the right dentist to do this important work for me. Your posting was a benefit to us all.... and hopefully you too.

Glad to hear you didn't get more mercury. So many dentists are still in denial about this.

Try to take it easy - the spike might have a stress connection...? Hope it works out OK for you.

 

Cheers @dboy hopefully things well settle down again.

Good luck getting your mercury fillings removed!

 

@mick1987 thanks for the rundown and also thanks @Leah it puts me at a bit more ease

it still seems odd that after 4 days your ears would get worse. are they any better yet? usually acoustic damage is pretty instant i thought.

i have my appointment on tuesday but i think i am going to push it back and go to a few other dentists in town. i really love the people at this office but they don't have all the technology i'd like. even though i know my one cavity is probably too big for air abrasion / laser I just have to have it checked out first. i couldn't live with myself if i didn't.

 

@russiancarl I now believe its the mercury in the fillings i had done is why my T has got worse! I didn't even know, I presumed they were composite resin fillings because of all the dangers associated with mercury, although the fillings weren't metallic and shiny they were a blue grey colour, I phoned up the dentist to ask what type of fillings they were and she said amalagam fillings! I feel like such an idiot I never asked beforehand!

If you do go to the dentist, make sure they use the newer safer composite white fillings.

It makes sense now why it took awhile for the T to worsen!

 

@mick1987 you really think its the new filling? was it put in incorrectly? the newer ones are amalgam/mercury but i think it would take a longer time than a few days for mercury poisoning to affect your tinnitus, no?

did you have any of these types of fillings before? how odd.

are you going to go back and have it redone? i am definitely going with composite even if it doesn't last as long.

 

@mick1987 Did your T settle down, after the dentist?

 

Hi! The T definitely settled down again, I since come the conclusion it was nothing to do with the dentist/drilling/mercury fillings etc because there was a 4 day delay in the T playing up.....which it did!.....for awhile it sounded like an angry swarm of bees in my head!......I think it must of been caused by congestion/sinus issues etc I seemed to be frequently having, but the T did settle down again!

 

@mick1987 - Thank you so much for posting your original post and then your follow-up post 5 months later.

Your original post mirrors my experience.... dental drill for a crown at 30 seconds at a time (not 5 seconds then 10 seconds off). Then approx 7 days later... i get the "plugged ear" feeling followed an extremely loud T ringing in the same ear of the side where the drilling was done.

The T is loud and constant and compotes with what people are saying to me.

I pray that your experience in healing becomes my experience too.

Thanks for giving me some hope 5 months down the road in this journey I've been on for just 1 week.

P.S. For the record, I read on another post on TT that the US NIH.gov has posted that acoustic caused tinnitus can show up several days later.... not immediately.

 

@Leah , did the spike end up being permanent?

 

Hi,
No the spike did settle.
I continue to have dental work as needed.
We can never be sure what causes a spike, dental care is so important so I go when necessary. All the best to you.

 

Thank you so much for responding! This makes me feel a little better...

 

Relax, you will do fine

 

My T spiked for a month after I pressed a loud phone to my bad ear for less than a second.

I am worried about a permanent spike... I will be having this procedure while knowing that my life is literally on the line.

 

Bill,
I am so sorry you are going through this. All of us here have been in your place.
Whether it is dental work, new RX , unexpected noises the list goes on doesn't it?
Had a surprise yesterday from the loud hand dryers in ladies restroom!!!!
Hate to wear ear plugs all the time but wow!!!
I need a another dental implant, I have many. Poor dental care as a child.
While I go often to have my teeth cleaned, I cannot bring myself to take the risk of another implant. Dentist is a specialist, educated but cannot guarantee how it will affect tinnitus. Keep in touch, what is your procedure? When?

 

Replacing two fillings + one new filling. The teeth involved are front teeth on the upper jaw (so the sound will be louder compared to the sound of a dental procedure on the lower jaw). All of these teeth are in the same place, but I am considering spreading this work over 2 visits...

My dentist doesn't have the newer slower drills, so I am seeing another dentist this week. I haven't scheduled the actual appointment when the fillings will be done, yet.

I also almost had a spike as a result of a hand dryer. I was lucky - I was wearing my earplugs at the time it happened.