Duncan Equine Dental Services LLC is a woman-owned and operated small business. Katelyn is a Certified Equine Dental Provider (C/EDP).
04/19/2025
What can we see here? What structure is affected? Is this normal or not? What can we do about it? 🦷 🐴
This is abnormal secondary dentine overlying a pulp on this horse’s tooth. As most of you know by now, the pulp is where the vital structures of the tooth are located, so it’s imperative that no feed and bacteria can enter this structure. Normally the occlusal surface of the pulp is sealed off by a layer of secondary dentine, which we can normally see as a dark and shiny layer overlying the pulp.
However in this tooth, you can see this layer is abnormal and there is a defect in the centre. Upon further examination, the probe only catches on this defect and doesn’t insert down into the pulp chamber, which can be a sign that the tooth has potentially sealed the pulp off further down and won’t cause further issues. In some cases, where this doesn’t occur, an open pulp can lead to infection of the tooth or even tooth death. Either way though, we will continue to monitor this closely and intervene as required.
