We provide many types of Dental Implants, to give our patients all the options when they have lost, or about to lose teeth.
Of all the ways to replace missing teeth, Dental Implants can provide the best results.
Dental Implants look and feel like your own teeth
Based on a titanium ‘root’, they are incredibly strong and resistant to decay, just one of the benefits of using Dental Implants.
They don’t risk other teeth
Over the years, the most popular treatment for missing teeth has been Dental Bridges. They’re not expensive and can last a long time.
But often, bridges have to be fitted to adjacent teeth, and these teeth have to be ‘ground down’ to accept the fitting of the bridge. What we don’t want to do is risk other teeth in the long term, especially if they are weakened already bearing in mind that now two teeth are taking the burden of three.
Dental Implants stand alone, leaving other teeth completely unaffected.
It is very much our role to help people understand all their options. Its different for everybody, and most important for the patient to be happy with their choice.
Comfortable
Although Dental Implants ‘sounds like’ one of the more invasive treatments, it is because they are completely independent of any existing tooth, or root, that having Dental Implants fitted is one of the more comfortable of treatments.
We know it doesn’t sound right, but because we’re not going near the nerves of any live teeth, Implants are one of the least painful treatments and people often tell us they’re eating fine later the same day without any discomfort.
Mind the gaps
When teeth go missing, it is an extremely quick process for the gum and bone to ‘shrink’ back into the cavity left, and this can often happen within 48 hours. The end result is often a little uneveness in the gum line and sometimes, particularly with bridges it can leave a small recess which may only visible if you look closely, but can still felt by our patients.
If a tooth is still in place, it is possible that Dental Implants can sometimes be fitted as the old tooth is extracted (depending on available bone and conditions), which helps avoid this recess. So if you have wobbly teeth, contact us as soon as you can, and come in to find out what all the options are.
Dental Implants Last Longer
Because the Dental Implant root is embedded in the bone, it makes it much less likely to break than other methods of replacing teeth.
Although as a profession dentistry is conservative and we move slowly with new things, Implants have been around long enough to have some history. And whilst nothing is forever, Dental Implants are generally accepted as lasting a long time and for that reason we feel they are good value.
Current thinking is that Dental Implants should last 15 years or more, but that they do have to be looked after and kept clean to guard against infection, just like normal teeth in fact.
Implant Retained Dentures
The most common way to replace multiple missing teeth is the trusty denture.
But for a lot of denture wearers, the biggest problem is that the dentures are not fixed in place. This can be quite uncomfortable, leading to difficulty in eating and some embarrassment for the wearer.
We can now use Dental Implants to enhance the experience of dentures. Having an implant for every tooth would be very expensive, and the ‘implant retained denture’ instead uses the dental implants as ‘locators’ to keep the dentures fixed. This is a fantastic development, which we feel does offer the best of both worlds.
What to do next
If you are worried you may be about to lose all or some of your teeth, please come and talk to us. There are a number of options available, as well as those above, and it is easier to make decisions once you have all the information. There’s never any pressure to proceed and things are probably not as bad as they seem.
We’re offering free Cosmectic Consultations from now until the end of December, so why not come and talk it over.