Vital Pulp Therapy

Vital pulp therapy is a procedure used for a few different situations. We perform this procedure to keep a tooth alive when the pulp has been briefly exposed through trauma or surgical tooth shortening.

Vital pulp therapy is performed on fractured teeth if the fracture is very recent, when it has been less than 48 hours since the dental fracture occurred. When performed for a fractured tooth it’s done without shortening, or reduction of the tooth crown height.

The same procedure is also performed to alleviate trauma to soft tissue due to the tooth crown (as in a malocclusion). In this case the crown height is reduced to alleviate trauma to soft tissue .

The other time we commonly shorten canine teeth is if they are expected to cause trauma following removal of a tumor or oral mass.

These procedures are typically highly effective with a reported success rate of over 95% when done in a surgical setting.