A successful 46-year-old business woman who had not gone to the dentist for over a decade due to fear had a mouthful of rotten teeth, which had unexpectedly caused sinusitis and was even affecting her eyesight.
Carol Huang, a dentist at the Jhubei Leon Dental Implant Institute, says that the patient had kept herself busy concentrating on her career, which, coupled with a morbid fear of seeing the dentist, had kept her from going to the dentist even though she only had a few good teeth left. After a friend encouraged her to do so, she finally went to the dentist.
Huang found that the patient’s teeth were in terrible condition and a panoramic X-ray of her mouth showed that the root of an upper incisor had a hole about 2cm in diameter. After that, the patient abashedly said that her incisors had been shifty for quite a while, but that she had been too scared to do anything about it.
Photo: Hu Chien-sen, Liberty Times
照片:自由時報記者胡健森
The patient also said that over the past few years she had been suffering from sinusitis and that last year she started experiencing blurry vision in her left eye. She went to the doctor for treatment, but her condition never improved.
After Huang removed the patient’s incisors, she found that the perforation inside the roots of her teeth were full of pus. Huang quickly cleaned the wounds, gave her a bone graft, and then implanted eight upper and lower teeth and 12 artificial teeth. After a full dental reconstruction, her teeth were like new again.
The most important thing is that after a month the sinusitis that had been tormenting the patient for so long was finally gone, and the intraocular pressure in her left eye was also reduced. Having returned to normal, her blurry eyesight also improved. When she went to the dentist for a return visit, she shook her head and said that she never could have imagined that pain in her teeth could cause damage to her nose or eyes.
Photo: Tsai Chang-sheng, Liberty Times
照片:自由時報記者蔡彰盛
Huang surmises that a patient with this sort of situation was created by an infection that had been left untreated for over a decade. The pus pushing on her sinuses and her left eye caused the sinusitis and blurry vision in her left eye. This is a very rare case, Huang says.
(Liberty Times, Translated by Kyle Jeffcoat)
一名事業有成的四十六歲女性十多年畏懼看牙醫,一口爛牙竟然造成鼻竇炎,甚至影響眼睛視力。
新竹里昂牙醫診所醫師黃甄玫指出,這名患者一直忙於打拚事業,加上對看牙醫十分恐懼,就算牙齒只剩下幾顆可用,依然不敢看牙,在朋友的鼓勵下,才踏進診所就醫。
黃甄玫發現患者的牙齒不僅情況很糟,更糟的是全口攝影檢查發現,上排門牙上方的牙根,竟然有一個直徑約兩公分的大洞。患者才不好意思地說:「其實門牙會搖已經很久了,都不敢處理。」
患者還表示,近幾年來飽受鼻竇炎之苦,去年更出現左眼視力模糊,曾就醫診治,但都沒改善。
黃甄玫替患者拔除門牙後,發現牙根上方凹洞裡面積滿了膿,緊急清創並回填骨粉,然後為她上下各植八顆牙,另外再裝十二顆假牙,全口重建後,牙齒煥然一新。
最重要的是,一個月後,困擾患者已久的鼻竇炎好了,而且左眼的眼壓也驟然降低,恢復正常,視力模糊的情況也改善了。患者回診時直搖頭說:「怎麼樣也想不到,牙痛竟然會害了鼻子跟眼睛!」
黃甄玫估計,會造成患者這種情況,至少是長達十年以上的長期感染所造成,而且膿瘍長期頂到鼻竇,甚至左眼,才會造成鼻竇炎,以及眼壓增加的視力模糊,這種情形實在很少見。
(自由時報記者蔡彰盛)
The strongest earthquake to hit Taiwan in 25 years killed at least 16 people and damaged dozens of buildings, but the destruction was largely contained thanks to decades of preparedness work. Taiwan sits on the “Ring of Fire,” an arc of intense seismic activity along the Pacific Rim, and — much like neighboring Japan — has a long history of catastrophic quakes. How does April 3 compare with other recent quakes? The April 3 earthquake, which measured 7.4 on the moment magnitude scale, was felt across Taiwan. It was the most severe since a 7.6 magnitude quake in 1999 killed
A: Artificial intelligence technology has been causing controversy lately: a student was caught cheating with AI to win the grand prize in an art contest. B: That’s so absurd. Does this mean that AI paints better than humans? A: Maybe. Luckily, the student was later disqualified. B: And more absurdly, it’s becoming more and more popular to use AI technology to “resurrect” people. A: Yeah, some netizens even posted videos featuring the late singer CoCo Lee, who was “resurrected” by them with AI software. A: 人工智慧的爭議不斷,有學生違規使用AI參加美術展,甚至贏得首獎。 B: 真誇張,這是不是代表AI比人類還強大? A: 或許吧,幸好得獎資格被取消。 B: 還有更誇張的︰讓死者重現的「AI復活」技術越來越熱門。 A: 對啊,還有網友製作已故歌后李玟「復活」的影片呢! (By Eddy Chang, Taipei Times/台北時報張聖恩)
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