I've posted a few times before about the difficulties my dentist has had in
getting my mouth completely numb for dental procedures. I had to have two
fillings done last week (one new cavity, one re-do of broken filling). I
made it through OK, my dentist went out of his way to work with me and put
me at ease and although one of the teeth in question never did get
completely numb to where I didn't feel anything at all, I made it through it
OK.

Here's the thing. How my dentist went about this was to numb the individual
teeth (both were uppers, one on each side) instead of giving me a block
injection on each side. He said he thought that would be best for numbing
purposes as well as keeping the entire roof of my mouth from getting numb.
As I said, it worked fine on one tooth, the other was a little problematic
but I made it through. Because that tooth was a little problematic, my
dentist went ahead and gave me a block injection on that side. But it really
didn't numb that side any more at all, didn't really help any. However, it
numbed the OTHER side more. I promise you, I could literally feel a dividing
line of numbness on the center of my lips, and it was absolutely the
opposite side of my face from where I got that other shot that got number.

Is that common or are my oral nerves just weird?

It would be helpful to know just what kind of block injection was given.
But I'm guessing that if these are upper teeth we're talking about, and he
injected on both sides, one of the injections on the side that got numb
was a little higher than intended and he gave an inadvertent 2nd division
nerve block on the side you got numb. There is not significant crossover
of these 2nd division fibers of the midline.

Steve

--
Mark & Steven Bornfeld DDS
http://www.dentaltwins.com
Brooklyn, NY
718-258-5001

Listing specifically what kind of block he gave is a little bit out of my
knowledge base. I know that he gave me two shots not in the back of each jaw
but into the gum directly over the teeth he was going to work on. It worked
fine with the tooth on my right side, didn't have a problem at all with it
not being numb. The one on my left side was the one that was still a bit
sensitive ... that was the filling that was having to be replaced; my
dentist told me he thought I was feeling a bit of heat from the drill
because it was hard for him to judge just how far he was drilling since he
was taking out an old filling (he had his assistant really laying on the
water to that tooth, he said to try to ease the heat); I can buy that
although the feeling of discomfort I always get from dental procedures seems
more like cold than heat or outright pain, the best way I can describe it is
like an electric jolt of dry ice

Anyway, when that tooth was still showing itself to be sensitive, he gave me
a shot in the back of my jaw on my left side, which I took to be a block.
That's when it distinctly got number on my right side, the opposite side,
but did not seem to get any number on my left side where I got the other
shot.

I was just curious about this. I will note, just as an FYI, that it seems I
always have more problems getting completely numb on the left side of my
mouth. Work done on the right side of my mouth is nowhere near as
problematic.