Mouthful: Teen has record 232 teeth extracted from his mouth

A 17-year-old boy in India has had a whopping 232 teeth extracted from his mouth in a seven-hour operation.

Ashik Gavai had a large swelling on the side of his face, and tests found a rare abnormal growth had formed on the lower right side of his jaw.

The teen had been suffering with the unusual mass for 18 months, and decided to travel to Mumbai to seek further assessment after several local doctors failed to identify the cause of the problem.

"Initially, it was not very clear what it could be and so we decided to go in for surgery yesterday (Monday)," Dr Sunanda Dhivare-Palwankar said.

Medics managed to open the mass and were shocked to find scores of tiny teeth in the abnormal molar.

"At the final count, we had a total 232 small pearlies, all independently developing as teeth, coming out of that lone molar," Dr Dhivare-Palwankar said.

Ashik was diagnosed with complex composite odontoma or a benign tumour of the tooth, which can cause difficulties in eating, swallowing and lead to swelling on the victim's face, but is not life-threatening.

The hard, rock-like formation inside the teen's affected molar couldn't be removed by a dentist's drill.

A chisel-mallet procedure had to be used to break down the formation which was putting pressure on the jaw bone and surrounding healthy teeth.

Ashik now has a normal set of 28 teeth.

Altogether, two main surgeons and two assistants were involved in the surgery.

One of the surgeons, Dr Vandana Thorawade said there was a chance the condition could reoccur.

"Though we tried our best to remove every bit of teeth, there may have been some residual left. In that case, there are chances of those growing back."

Source: India Times
Author: Amy Huynh, Approving editor: Nick Pearson