A man was left “looking like Quagmire from Family Guy” after an agonising tooth infection caused his face to double in size.
Reece Mooney woke up in the middle of the night with an “intense throbbing pain” in his tooth, which became so unbearable that he called 111 for advice.
The 24-year-old was sent for an emergency dentist appointment the following morning, where they found a filling had cracked and become infected and formed an abscess.
He was given antibiotics and sent home, but that evening, his face began to swell dramatically, with shocking pictures that have gone viral on TikTok, garnering 3.8 million views, showing the change.
“I thought I’d sleep it off and it would hopefully have gone down by morning – but when I woke up, my face had doubled in size,” Reece, a bar supervisor from Liverpool, told What’s The Jam.
“I was in shock.
“I jokingly compared myself to Quagmire because my jaw was so swollen.
“I was unable to eat other than soup.
“I rang the number 111 had given me, and they told me to wait 48 hours for the antibiotics to work.
“But the next day, the swelling was even bigger.
“On the fourth day, I went to the shop just to get out of the flat for a bit, and had to wear a neck warmer to cover up the lump as I was anxious people would notice.”
Later that week, Reece went back to the dentist and was given different antibiotics to try, which helped the swelling to go down slightly.
He said: “The following night, I was lying in bed and tasted something horrible in my mouth.
“It turned out the abscess had burst, and I felt immediate pain relief.”
While the infection has now gone, Reece has been left concerned that something similar may happen again, with the troublesome tooth having also needed a root canal in recent months.
He added: “I’m currently attempting to register with a dentist in Liverpool – I’m originally from Dorset and a lot of practices aren’t accepting NHS patients at the moment, so I’m just waiting.
“But in the back of my mind, I’m still worried it could happen again if it’s not fixed soon.”
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