Missing teeth don’t just affect how you look: Even one missing tooth can affect your ability to speak clearly and eat comfortably. A single missing tooth can also force all of your other teeth out of alignment, leading to severe problems with your bite, jaw, and oral health.
According to the American College of Prosthodontists, over 36 million individuals in America have edentulism (i.e., are completely toothless) and more than 120 million suffer from partial edentulism (i.e., missing at least one tooth). Having a full set of functioning teeth is important for your oral health and mental well-being.
The good news is that you have plenty of options to restore your missing tooth or teeth. At Dental Town DC, our dental team recommend natural-looking, fully functional dental implants.
If you’re ready to replace your missing teeth and enhance the appearance of your smile, continue reading to learn more about dental implants to find out if they’re right for you.
Dental implants are individual
Dental implants are distinct from dentures, another common option for people with missing teeth. Dentures are a type of removable prosthesis that replaces an entire arch (or most of the arch) of teeth. In contrast, implants are single false teeth that are individually and permanently fixed into your mouth.
Each dental implant consists of three parts:
- A titanium post that acts as a false tooth root
- An abutment that links the post to the crown
- A crown that serves as the false tooth
The titanium post is inserted into your jaw bone, where it fuses with your jaw. That’s how dental implants help to stimulate bone growth, which prevents jaw bone atrophy. This one attribute alone makes dental implants the best choice for your oral health.
The next best thing to your real tooth
Dental implants look and feel like natural teeth. They fit perfectly into the spaces left by your missing teeth. A dental implant improves your overall health by:
- Restoring your smile
- Boosting your self-confidence
- Facilitating easier eating
- Enabling clearer speech
- Protecting your overall tooth alignment
- Creating healthy pressure on your jawbone
Here’s the best part: You treat dental implants like natural teeth, by brushing and flossing twice a day and visiting the dentist at least twice a year. You can’t take implants out, so you don’t have to soak them at night, the way you do with dentures.
Are you a candidate?
Dental implants are the best kind of tooth replacement in an ideal case. However, they can’t work for every patient. To be considered as a candidate for dental implants, you should:
- Have healthy gums
- Have healthy, dense jaw bone
- Be in overall good health and cleared for surgery
- Be willing to commit to the recovery times
Smoking can delay healing and affect the success of your implants, so talk to our dental team if you’d like a referral to a smoking cessation program. Although implants and implant surgery are safe for most people, tell the dentist if you have diabetes or another condition that affects your immune system.
If your jawbone has already begun to atrophy, the dentist may suggest a minimally invasive sinus bone graft that adds mass to your jawbone. Bone grafts take several months to heal and fuse with your existing bone. After a bone graft, though, you have enough jaw bone to support a dental implant.
Although dental implants require a longer process than dentures, including surgery to place the implants, they’re the next-best option to healthy natural teeth and can make you feel like a new person. When you’re ready to explore your implant options, contact us to find out if dental implants are right for you.
To request an appointment, contact our office at Dental Town DC or schedule your consultation online today.