Our teeth are highly rigid in nature but are also vulnerable to break and split into pieces.  Despite the care on teeth, break or fractures in teeth occur when we meet a strong hit on the mouth, bite a strong substance with teeth, frequently grind the teeth, etc. Teeth cavities and large amalgam fillings can also compromise the teeth’s structural integrity with cracks.

Minor chips and craze lines over a tooth’s outer enamel are fairly petty issues. On the other hand, split tooth, cracks that extend to the gum tissues, fracture in a tooth’s root, broken cusp require immediate treatment from a dentist to repair.

Some people with a more significant fracture in a tooth do not feel chronic pain. It makes them ignore such dental fractures. As the teeth cannot repair themselves, neglecting such tooth cracks will provoke more dental discomforts as well as serious health hazards.

Dangers of an untreated broken tooth

The sharp edges left by the chip or breach in a tooth may hurt the soft tissues like tongue present inside the mouth. If the crack is extended to the nerve, the fractured tooth will cause intense pain and sensitivity when it gets contact with the food items. It makes eating quite annoying.

1) Infect the soft tissues and kill the tooth

If the crack is quite deep, the inner layers beneath the tooth enamel will be exposed. The bacteria can easily enter those regions and penetrate the inner pulp which contains the tooth’s blood vessels. When the pulp chamber along the nerves and blood vessels are compromised with bacterial infections, the tooth will lose its efficiency and will end in the dead tooth.

2) It pushes the tooth to break

Infection inside a tooth cannot be avoided after the chips or cracks. The accumulation of bacteria weakens the tooth over a period of time. If the tooth break occurs due to cavities, then the tooth’s density will constantly be diminishing. In such cases, the cracked tooth cannot endure the pressure with food items we eat. Such pressure sensitivity will put the damaged tooth at risk of split vertically or eventually break at any time.

3) Tooth Abscess

When the oral bacteria enter through the crack and infect the tooth’s inner pulp region, the nerves, blood vessels along with other tissues are also executed with the bacterial attack and discharge the disposals. The discharged contents produce a pocked or pus called Abscess.

Such dental abscess is highly adverse to oral health. If it is left untreated, the abscess drags the infection to the alveolar bone that surrounds the tooth to support and make the bone also prone to infection. The other side effects of abscess include infection in the sinus sets present in the facial region.

4) Life-threatening Diseases

Sepsis is a harmful condition which can be occurred with bacterial infection anywhere in the body. Dental Abscess occurs due to untreated cracked teeth also leads to sepsis. Typically, our body produces and releases chemicals into the bloodstream in order to fight against the infections. Sepsis is powerful to alter the body’s response to those chemicals and release harmful toxins in the bloodstream.

It infects various organs and ends in blood clots which cause heart attack, stroke, decrease the blood pressure level and eventually lead to death.

5) Oral Mucosal Trauma

Oral mucosa is the mucous membrane lining and has a connective called lamina propria. The role of mucous membrane lining inside the mouth is to provide the dental health an immunological defense with the secretion of antibodies.

Researches show that injuries or trauma inside the oral mucosa region are also associated with oral cancer. Broken teeth, decayed teeth, ill-fitted dentures are the main factors which hurt or injure the oral mucosa region and cause mucosal trauma.

Mucosal trauma leads the cancer cyst develops in the regions like tongue, jaw and inner neck.


A cracked or Broken tooth is actually an open wound inside the mouth. The damaged tooth can be saved and the mentioned side effects can be prevented if the tooth is repaired immediately. Delay in treating such chipped teeth will require some expensive treatments like Root Canal Therapy and restorative appliances like dental crowns to retain the tooth’s actual structure.