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Same-Day Wisdom Tooth Removal Without an Appointment in Korea (Full Experience)
Wisdom Tooth Removal Experience (from a Korean perspective)
🔬 Just went in for a cleaning… and surprise, it’s a rotten wisdom tooth
At the end of 2024, I walked into my neighborhood dental clinic for a simple scaling (cleaning), but the dentist casually said, “Your wisdom tooth is decayed.”
I had felt food getting stuck in a hole at the back of my mouth recently and would often dig it out with a toothpick. Turns out… that hole was actual decay.
Having never had a cavity in my life, I was pretty shocked. But thankfully, the decay hadn’t reached the nerve, so there was no pain, and the dentist said it wasn’t urgent to extract right away.
So I decided to wait. By early 2025, I was getting more and more annoyed by food getting stuck there again, so I decided to get it pulled out ASAP.
💻 Online research vs. real-life situation
In my family, everyone except my mom has wisdom teeth. But I’m the first one to actually have one go bad, so I had no one to ask. Naturally, I Googled.
All the blogs and forums said things like:
You’ll have to wait 2-3 weeks just to get an X-ray.
You must go to a university hospital if it’s impacted.
If it’s done wrong, you can go temporarily blind.
…Excuse me???
Even calling around to dental clinics near me, I was told “We don’t have time today,” or “We don’t do extractions unless it’s a prior appointment.”
Eventually, I found a super old neighborhood dental clinic that’s been around for 20+ years. It wasn’t listed prominently online, but I gave it a shot—and they said I could come right in.
After reviewing my X-ray, they said the tooth was definitely decayed but nicely positioned, and they could extract it right then and there. That caught me off guard, so I promised to come back the next morning and went home.
📌 TIP: If your wisdom tooth isn’t impacted and you’re looking for same-day removal, check out long-established neighborhood clinics. They’re often more flexible than bigger hospitals.
🔦 X-ray and pre-extraction assessment
Here’s what my X-ray looked like.
- The red arrow points to the decayed area. The cavity was about 0.2–0.3cm in diameter.
- The yellow arrow shows that the root was slightly curved, but the dentist said it was nothing to worry about.
🦷 Anesthesia and extraction process
That black hole? Yeah, that’s the decay.
| Step | Details | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Local Anesthesia | About 5–6 shots using an I-Ject auto-syringe. No pain. | -5 minutes |
| Extraction | Pulled out in one go with dental forceps. | -1 minute |
| Bleeding | Gauze compression. Bleeding stopped in 1.5 hours. | 1.5 hours |
| Prescription | Antibiotics and painkillers for 3 days. | — |
I’d read so many horror stories about how painful the anesthesia is, so I braced myself. But the clinic used an I-Ject auto-injector (which looks quite large and intimidating), and honestly, I barely felt anything.
My friend recently got hers pulled without this tool and had a tough time, so I guess not every clinic uses I-Ject.
After anesthesia, I had to wait about 40 minutes. Boring.
When it was time, they told me to hold my head steady. As the dentist twisted and pulled, my head kind of moved with the motion. I heard a couple crunchy sounds, then—pop—it was out.
I got my meds from a nearby pharmacy.
Cost breakdown: 24,000KRW for extraction, 6,000KRW for medication.
Pretty cheap compared to what I’d read online (50,000+KRW).
❤️🩹 Recovery timeline
- Day 1: Slight soreness. Normal daily activities were fine.
- Day 3: Swelling mostly gone. Returned to normal meals.
- Day 7: Extraction site stable.
- Day 30: Fully healed. There’s still a small hole, but no issues.
Many online sources recommend cold compresses, but I didn’t need one. If your wound is small and clean, you probably don’t need it either.
📌 Cold compresses are useful if you had an impacted tooth or needed sutures. Not necessary for simpler extractions.
🏁 Final thoughts
This was my first time having a decayed tooth, so I was scared. But honestly, it wasn’t painful or scary at all.
That said, it’s still a wound. It made me reflect on how important oral hygiene really is. I’m brushing more carefully now and hoping I don’t have to go through this again.
If you’re hesitating to get your wisdom tooth removed, don’t wait too long. Once the nerve gets involved, it becomes a whole other level of pain.