Implant Dentures & Renewed Confidence

Implant Dentures give back your confidence When someone loses all of their teeth, they need "false teeth" or dentures. This has been so for the longest time. President George Washington had a set of wooden dentures!

Implant dentures have added an entirely new face to this very traditional solution to total tooth loss.

Over time, dentures get loose. This is something entirely inevitable. Denture Adhesives (basically sticky goo-like substance to make the dentures stick) have been popularized just to address the problem of loosening dentures. While they have their usefulness, they do not solve the underlying problem. What causes the dentures to get loose in the first place?

Dentures get loose over time because what they sit on (namely the gums, soft tissue and the jaw bone) change their shape. More specifically, the jaw bone deteriorates and shrinks over time. You can think of the jaw bone as a solid cube. The teeth once used to be embedded in this cube. As the teeth are lost, the bone that was right around the teeth is lost as well. The "cube" now is losing height and width. This is the reason why a new denture wearer finds that their dentures which fit really well just 6 months ago, now seem too big for their mouth!

This initial rapid bone loss usually ends after about 1 to 2 years after the tooth was lost. Then, the bone is lost gradually, at a slower pace. This has to do with the bone not being used to house any teeth or teeth-like things (enter dental implants).

Dental implants can dramatically reduce this bone loss. That is one of their benefits. The other benefit is that they can be used to stabilize a loose denture by giving the denture something to snap onto instead of simply resting on the gums. This is especially useful for those who have been wearing dentures for a long time and have lost quite a bit of jaw bone. In some cases a bar is used to in between the implants. In other cases, smaller attachments (called ball attachments) are used.

4 Implant Ball Retained Denture Implant Denture retained and stabilized by a bar connecting the implants

Contrary to common belief, you don't need one implant for each lost tooth. Each denture can be stabilized with as few as 2 implants and usually no more than 4.

2 Implant used as attachments to a denture Dentures helped by use of dental implants

Placing more implants turns the case from an implant denture (which are still removable by the patient) to a fixed implant denture (which is not removable).

Fixed, non-removeable implant dentures Implant denture before delivery to the patient

Extreme care is taken to ensure proper placement of these implants. 3-D computer imaging, design and fabrication of dental models allow for extremely accurate and quick placement of dental implants.

In the event that there are some teeth remaining but are deemed hopeless, the preliminary case work can be done ahead of time. The teeth are then removed, implant are placed and the newly fabricated dentures are delivered. That way, the patient will walk out with teeth right after their appointment.

Mini Dental Implants (MDI's) have proven handy in situations where a regularly-sized dental implant might have been too big to use. Of course, if there has been extensive bone loss, other bone growth and bone grafting procedures would be necessary prior to placement of any dental implants.

To see if you can benefit from this solution to loose dentures, click the link to schedule your complimentary consultation with your San Diego Implant Denture Doctor.