Impacted Tooth

A tooth is considered impacted when it is blocked from erupting by another tooth, bone, or soft tissue. Lower third molars (wisdom teeth) are the most frequently impacted, followed by upper canines. Impactions may be classified as soft-tissue or bony, and as mesioangular, distoangular, vertical, or horizontal depending on the tooth's orientation. Symptoms can include pain, swelling, recurrent infection (pericoronitis), damage to neighbouring roots, and cyst formation, but many impactions are asymptomatic and discovered on routine X-rays. Treatment ranges from observation to surgical extraction or orthodontic exposure to bring the tooth into alignment.