Have had a tooth bothering me on and off for probably a year. 2 weeks ago Saturday morning I woke up with pain from my neck down to my elbow on right side, same side as bad tooth. That Sunday night tooth pain went through the roof for 8hrs straight, thought I was gonna have to go to er it was so bad. Finally got in with a dentist that Wednesday, got on amoxicillan and tooth pain went away. That next Sunday my finger tips started going numb and have been so along with original pain from neck down to elbow, as of today. Anybody have similar experiences? Or any ideas?

Pull tooth.

May need an MRI to check for a bulging disc in your neck.

In my experience with a tooth that is giving intolerable pain either a root canal or get it pulled was my options.

No matter where you live, there should be an entry in your phone list that says " Emergency Dentist".
Endodontists see many patients brought in in a fetal position for Root Canals. Go now. This isn't over.

Getting tooth pulled Tuesday. Had to take the meds for infection first.

Ive had that nerve pain from shoulder blade to elbow to numb fingers in both arms. Has to do with bulging discs as clayk said … ive been through PT and chiropractor treatments that have calmed it down.

Having to take antibiotics to "calm" the infection before extraction is an old and outdated concept that amazingly is still prevalent with many General dentists.

Current thinking (at least since the 80's) is remove the source of infection ie: root canal to remove dead/dying nerve tissue and incision/drainage of abcess if present or extract the tooth. Do one of these to eliminate the infection quickly. Not removing the source of the infection quickly can allow the infection to spread into deeper tissue even while taking antibiotics which can become much more serious.

Did you know it happened as soon as it did, or did you just randomly start experiencing pain?

If you are feeling burning sensations down your arm as well as tingling that would be my suspicion as I have that problem.

For me it kinda set in over time until one day it became impossible to ignore. I was eating so much Ibuprofin for it my gut was getting sick. I got a nerve block shot and learned stretching exercises. I can deal with it fine now, but it took a long time to where I can. Surgery though I do not want to do as it is high risk no matter what they say.
I also got shoulders and the rest of my spine to deal with and once the surgery cycle begins it seems to never stop for a lot of people. I'm not ready to get on that bus.

Thanks for info. Dentist recommended root canal within the next 3 weeks. He doesn't do root canals so I decided to just have it pulled and scheduled for this Tuesday with him. I'm not so sure it's the tooth now, I'm thinking it's the bulging disk in neck. Weird timing maybe

I woke up that Saturday morning 2 weeks ago took a shower ate breakfast and then all of sudden the pain hit kinda out of nowhere with no warnings before hand

One problem, if they can't drain the infection right away is the numbing injection won't act correctly to numb it, so it can be pulled without a lot of pain involved. The infection blocks the injection from reaching the nerve.

That's very true, local anesthetic can be neutralized in the presence of infection. That said, there are techniques to get the area numb even with infection present and out of the 60+ thousand teeth I have removed there aren't many that I couldn't get numb. Of course there is general anesthesia for those that need it.

I have had one root canal and the guy opened up the tooth and put the needle directly into the nerve, from the top. It felt much better then. He went on a finished it up then. Glad I still have all my teeth in good condition at 68. Modern dentistry is so great.

I have had a bunch of root canals and every one was pretty much pain free, except one. And that was a doozy. Doc could not get it numb with injections so he started using something that numbed just a little. He would put some on, wait a little while and start drilling. When I came off the chair he would stop and do it over again. That root canal lasted about two lifetimes.

I have nerve issues that affect my left shoulder blade and down left arm. Also two fingers pulled towards each other no matter if it's bothering me or not