It is a very common and dangerous habit among the public to immediately buy and take an antibiotic from the pharmacy whenever they experience a toothache or facial swelling. According to general dental pharmacology, antibiotics are not used for every tooth abscess or swelling. If the abscess is localized, meaning it is limited only to the root tip of the tooth, and the patient does not have systemic infection symptoms such as fever, weakness, or swollen lymph nodes, antibiotics will not contribute to healing. In this case, the only thing to do is to drain the pus (inflammation) from the infected tooth by performing root canal treatment or to extract the tooth. Antibiotics are only prescribed to support treatment in cases of systemic spread where the infection has spread beyond the localized area to the jaw and neck (cellulitis/Ludwig’s angina), and the patient has a high fever and cannot open their mouth (trismus).
