While I believe your opinion is the 'right' one, in these days of
'insurance', the patient might have an 80% benefit for the endo,
and 50% coverage on the bridge.  The payment for the 'correct'
treatment (implants) might be ZERO.

Economics can often lead to decisions based on less than sound
treatment options.

JMO,
Steve

Maybe the teeth had drifted forward and the third molar had large well
separated roots.??

On Apr 10, 11:57 am, Bob Adkins <m...@pit.com> wrote:

Endo on #32 (wisdom tooth)? WTF!  Weren't you told about implants
( and bone grafting)  for #30 and #31 areas. Is only #31 missing? All
that to replace a 2nd molar? How many dentists would utilize a wisdom
tooth, with endo mind you, as an abutment for a bridge? Not a good
situation if this is indeed true. I hope that I have it all wrong.
Someone straighten me out.

Thanks for the reply!

I specifically asked my dentist if the wisdom tooth was sufficient to
support such a large bridge. He said he used a loose formula, which
showed there was plenty of root to support it. No. 32 did indeed
appear to be pretty robust for a wisdom tooth.

No. 32 was tilted forward due to 31 and 30 being missing for years,
and the crown was cracked. The crack had to be removed and the tooth
crowned,  so my dentist sort of talked me into doing the bridge while
we were crowning the tooth anyway. He did mention an implant. The
price made me almost swallow the irrigation tube, so we didn't discuss
it at length. Regardless of expense, I would have preferred a
sure-thing implant to iffy wisdom tooth anchorage. Even implants have
a significant failure rate, as I understand it.

On the first root canal attempt, X-Ray showed a little filler material
extruding from 1 of the root tips. The reworked root canal X-Ray
showed a significant blob of filler material extruding from 1 root.

My dental insurance is almost worthless. It does pay 80%, but only up
to $1K maximum per year. I doubt it could  have been a factor in the
decision making process.

Many thanks,,,