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When can you eat after a filling?

I am a 22 year old male. I want to know when can you eat after a filling?

14 Answers

Good question, typically you can eat as soon as the numbness wears off.
If it is a tooth colored filling, generally right away.
If the filling is a tooth color filling, you can eat right away. It is always best to wait until anesthesia wears off, so you don't bite yourself.
2-3 hours recommended to wait with eating AND drinking warm/too cold drinks.
If you had a silver mercury containing filling, you should wait 1 to 2 hours. Modern tooth-colored fillings set immediately, so you can put pressure on the tooth. However, IF YOU ARE STILL NUMB, you may want to wait to do any chewing until after the numbness goes away, as you could bite your lip!
It is best to eat after the "numbness" wears off and the feelings return to your mouth.
Composite fillings right away. Silver you need to take it easy on it for 24 hours, as it gets harder over time. The only other reason to wait is you are still numb and could bite your tongue or cheek a lot and be really sore. Certain anesthetics will be gone in one hour or less, 4 hours or less, or 8-12 hours or less. Depending on the person, that can also last longer. It is best to ask this question to your dentist when he does the procedure to tailor it to you particular situation.
It depends what material was used on the filling, but normally if it is light cured you can eat as soon as you leave……be careful not to bite your cheek while you are still numb.


Jim Kline
Depends if you are numb. For traditional fillings there is no set wait time, but I usually tell my patients to wait until they are not numb so as to not bite the lip or tongue.
If it is permanent filling you can eat right away.
Any time.
yes you can!
You can eat after the filling any time as long as you did not need the local anesthetic.
First, wait till you are not numb. Silver fillings are several hours, white fillings, right away.