4 Strategies for Preventing Dry Socket After Tooth Extraction

We determined that you have a tooth (or maybe a few teeth) that aren’t doing your dental health any favors, so we recommended extraction.

Dentists across the country remove millions of teeth each year — often wisdom teeth — and the good news is that most of these procedures go off without a hitch. That said, there is one complication that occurs in 2% to 5% of tooth extractions — dry socket. And this complication can be painful, so it’s one you’d do well to avoid.

To help prevent dry socket after your oral surgery here at Silverlake Smiles, our team, under the guidance of Dr. Juliet Ebrahimian, pulled together a few great strategies, which we share with you here.

Dry socket— a disruption in healing

Before we get into preventive strategies for dry socket, let’s set the stage a little so you understand what we’re up against.

When we remove your tooth, we remove everything, including the roots that go down into your jawbone. When we do this, we leave behind an empty socket.

In most cases, your body gets straight to work on the healing process, which occurs in four stages:

1. Hemostasis — stopping the bleeding
2. Inflammation — setting the stage for repairs
3. Cell proliferation — tissue regrowth
4. Maturation and modeling — putting the finishing touches on the cellular repair

With tooth extraction, the first and second stages are initiated by the formation of a clot in the empty socket where your tooth once was. This clot protects the empty space and creates a space where your body can perform the four stages of healing.

When you develop dry socket, it means that the clot gets dislodged, which can slow healing and lead to a considerable amount of pain. In other words, dry socket is a complication you definitely want to avoid.

Best practices for avoiding dry socket

From the moment you leave our office, we want you to take steps to encourage healing, which means taking steps to prevent dry socket. These steps include:

1. Avoid suction

One of the most common reasons people develop dry socket is due to suction inside the mouth. For example, after your extraction, you drink a beverage through a straw or you take a drag of a cigarette — these are two actions that create suction inside your mouth. And this suction is often strong enough to dislodge the blood clot.

To give you an idea about how real this threat is, 12% of people who smoke after their extraction develop dry socket compared to only 4% in people who don’t smoke. 

2. Rinse gently

It’s important to keep your mouth clean and free from harmful bacteria after your tooth extraction, but we don’t necessarily want you to brush around the socket. Instead, we might have you rinse your mouth for a day or two. When you rinse, do so gently — rigorous swishing can be as disruptive as suction when it comes to the blood clot in the socket.

3. Stick to soft foods

For the first couple of days after your tooth extraction, it’s a good idea to stick to soft foods — mashed potatoes, soup, etc. If you introduce hard foods too quickly, they can dislodge the newly formed clot that’s protecting your socket.

4. Watch out for hormone medications

If you’re taking an oral contraceptive that contain estrogen, it may increase the risk of a dry socket. Rest assured, we go over this with you ahead of time and come up with a plan that considers the fact that you’re on the medication.

If you follow these preventive strategies, there’s every reason to believe that your post-extraction journey will be a smooth one.

If you have more questions about your upcoming tooth extraction and how to prevent dry socket, please don’t hesitate to contact our Los Angeles office. We serve the Silver Lake neighborhood and areas of Los Feliz, Atwater Village, Frogtown, and Echo Park.