All my adult life..

[ajames54]

..I've had a hard time clearing my right ear.. either when diving or flying.
It would often take me three times as long as my partners to get to depth on a dive. But I was used to it and it didn't bug me too much.

Recently as part of some serious dental work I had two root canals done on my lower right jaw, no pain issues but I needed crowns. Since that point I clear as fast as anyone I dive with and faster than many..

So I have to assume that even though I was not actively experiencing pain from my teeth there must have been enough irritation present to hamper my tubes and keep me from clearing..

If I had known that this would be the result of the root canal I would have had them done twenty years ago.

Is this sort of thing common, or even normal? Or is this another reason I'm a freak?

 

[shakeybrainsurgeon]

My guess is that you weren't having trouble clearing at all, but was instead experiencing a dental block due to a leaky filling or chronic cavity and the pain was REFERRED to the ear. Molar pain may often be confused for earache. The crown and root canal fixed the air leak in the tooth, but didn't affect the eustachian tubes...

 

[fisherdvm]

I would wonder if a small tooth root abcess was stimulating your adenoids. Enlarged adenoids can cause compression of the eustachian tube, explaining why some ENT would recommend tonsils and adenoids removal in conjunction with tubes for children with repeated ear infections.

 

[shakeybrainsurgeon]

An abscess is a possibility, but I doubt you would harbor a true bacterial abscess "all my adult life" with the only symptom being a problem with ear clearing. Eventually it would either drain or cause pain/sepsis that forced a trip to the dentist. Chronic, sterile swelling around the tooth is more likely.

 

[ajames54]

I think that the small root abcess is possible, I would have bouts of severe pain that cleared with antibiotics, they would occur every 9 months or so.. and the ear cleared with the right techniques just really slowly.

Long story short.. prior to the root canals I had never had any work done that was not incredably painful, so even though I knew that there was a problem the small amounts of pain that indicated a new bout of antibiotics were necessary was much easier to deal with.