Usually, teenagers complain about tooth aches whenever a wisdom tooth pops out of nowhere. Ashik Gavai, a 17-year-old boy from India, proved to be a very unique case when oral surgeons removed an astonishing 232 teeth from his mouth. 232!
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Photo credit: Indo-Asian News Service, via BBC
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18 months before the boy's surgery, he complains about swelling and pain in right lower jaw. The doctors on his village weren't able to find the cause of the problem so he was referred to J.J. Hospital in Mumbai. Sunanda Dhiware could not immediately find the cause of the odd growth with regular tests and decided to bring him on a surgery. When she cut into the gums of the boy, they notice dozens of tiny teeth in different variables.
Doctor Dhiware diagnosed Ashik with complex composite odontoma, which is when enamel and dentin grow abnormally, resulting in an excessive number of tooth-like structures. The condition is rare and the teeth are essentially benign tumors.
Over the course of the seven-hour-long surgery, Dhiware, another surgeon, and two assistants extracted 232 of the teeth. Dhiware
told BBC that the structure couldn�t be cut out using traditional methods. This forced the to break it into pieces using a hammer and chisel, which is an outdated method that is now very rarely employed. After the odontoma was cracked, the team removed hundreds of small teeth
ranging in size from a mustard seed to a marble. The dentists also removed the molar that was affected by the condition, though it was removed with traditional methods.
Dhiware told
IBTimes that as far as she knows, the greatest amount of teeth ever extracted because of this condition was 37, but she needs to do more research in the literature before she comments on whether this could be a world record. However, she
told BBC Gavai�s condition was unlike anything she had seen in 30 years of dentistry, and she was "thrilled to get such an exciting case.�
Following the surgery, Gavai was left with 28 teeth; a normal amount of teeth for an adult. Dhiware did not comment about Gavai�s
prognosis, which is dependent upon early diagnosis and management.
Images from the surgery
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