When you suffer from tooth loss, this can lead to major issues with the health and stability of your smile. To avoid these and restore your ability to smile with confidence, we need to replace what has been lost. In today’s blog, your Shrewsbury, MA, dentist discusses the benefits of addressing tooth loss with dental implants!
What Causes Missing Teeth?
Why do we lose natural teeth? For some, this could be due to a serious injury to the face or jaw, untreated cavities and infections, or even the presence of periodontitis, the advanced stage of gum disease. As part of your treatment, we will need to assess the cause of your tooth loss, so that our team can select the right replacement option for you. We may also need to treat any underlying issues that could impact your dental implants, such as periodontitis.
The Long-Term Impact of Missing Teeth
How does tooth loss impact your smile and your oral health? When teeth go missing, this could allow the remaining ones to drift since there is now an open space in the smile. This misalignment could not only change the appearance of your smile, but also increase the risk of issues like tooth decay and gum disease. The strain on your jaw joints due to missing teeth could lead to an increased risk of TMJ disorder and bruxism (teeth grinding). You could be limited in your meal options and may feel embarrassed in social situations, as this could impact how you speak.
But there is also an impact on your facial structure and youthful appearance! As the body stops sending doses of calcium and phosphorus to the jaw around the missing root, the jawbone breaks down. This loss of mass and density then leads to further tooth loss and an older appearance! But we can help prevent these potential complications with the placement of dental implants.
Planning Your New Smile
To get started, our team will take a close look at your smile to assess the cause and extent of the issue, in case we need to manage issues like gum disease. Next, we assess the strength of your jawbone. We want to make sure there is enough structure to support your new tooth roots. If not, we could discuss treatments like jawbone grafting or a sinus lift to strengthen the smile and make it ready to support dental implants. Our team also wants to choose the best angles, positions, and depths to insert these posts, ensuring your jawbone remains strong and fortified.
Anesthesia and Sedation
We know the placement process requires oral surgery and that can make some people feel nervous. Which is why we take steps to ensure you are calm and comfortable through the process, enjoying a positive experience in our office. Our team can administer a local anesthetic to the areas where the new roots are being paled to numb them. With dental sedation, we can choose a calming medication to help you enter a deep state of calm and relaxation, often with no memory of the procedure at all.
Dental Implants
The dental implant portion is a biocompatible titanium post that we insert into the jawbone. Once in place, this acts as a new root and stimulates the growth of the jaw, so you don’t lose mass and density. For an individual one, we will then connect an abutment to the post so we can attach a crown, one custom-made for your smile to absorb daily bite forces and offer a lifelike appearance, so you can smile with confidence once again.
Hybrid Dentures
What if you are missing most or all of your teeth? In these situations, your jawbone could gradually weaken until you develop an older appearance and have trouble rating your favorite foods. But with dental implants, we could insert multiple posts into the jaw and then connect a custom-made denture to them. Hybrid dentures are fixed in place and never need to be removed for cleaning or soaking, and they ever slip when you eat or speak either! Instead, you have a full row of new and lifelike teeth that can stay in place for decades to come, far longer than traditional removable dentures.
If you have any questions about how we address tooth loss with dental implants, then contact our team today.
Do You Want to Address the Gap in Your Smile?
Our team is eager to take on your tooth loss, whether you have one missing tooth or several that need replacement. To learn more about implant dentistry, please call Modern Dentistry Of Shrewsbury today at 508-842-8838.
