People live longer than ever before, and while regular brushing, flossing, and checkups help many of us maintain our natural smiles, sometimes our teeth need extra help. Dental implants can restore your smile and oral health if you've lost a tooth or several teeth due to injury or disease.

Dental implants are artificial tooth roots of titanium or similar materials surgically placed into the bone beneath the gums. Once in place, they provide a foundation for mounting replacement teeth, which can be permanently attached or removable. Permanent teeth are more stable and feel more like natural teeth.

Before deciding to get dental implants, it's essential to determine if you're a suitable candidate and to discuss any potential risks or complications with Dr. Kau.

 

Benefits of Dental Implants

 

• ​Improved Appearance: Dental implants look and feel like your own teeth. They are designed to fuse with bone, making them permanent and giving you a natural-looking smile.
• Enhanced Comfort: Because implants become part of your jawbone, they eliminate the discomfort of removable dentures.
• Better Speech: With poor-fitting dentures, the teeth can slip within the mouth, causing you to mumble or slur your words. Dental implants allow you to speak without the worry that teeth might slip.
• Easier Eating: Sliding dentures can make chewing difficult. Dental implants function like teeth, allowing you to eat your favorite foods confidently and without pain.
• Improved Oral Health: Unlike tooth-supported bridges, dental implants don't require reducing other teeth, helping to preserve your natural teeth. Also, individual implants allow easier access between teeth, improving oral hygiene.
• Durability: Implants are very durable and can last many years. With good care, many implants can last a lifetime.
• Convenience: Dental implants eliminate the inconvenience of removing dentures or dealing with messy adhesives to keep them in place.
• Bone Preservation: When teeth are lost, bone mass in the jaw also decreases. Implants integrate with the jawbone, preserving it and preventing further bone loss.
• Natural Function: Dental implants function like natural teeth, allowing you to bite and chew with full force and stability.
• Improved Self-Esteem: Dental implants can give you back your smile and confidence. They can help you feel better about yourself and your appearance.

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Single or Multiple Implants

Implants are versatile. If you are only missing one tooth, one implant plus one replacement tooth will do the trick. If you are missing several teeth in a row, a few strategically placed implants can support a permanent bridge (a set of replacement teeth). Similarly, if you have lost all of your teeth, a full bridge or full denture can be permanently fixed in your mouth with a strategic number of implants.

Advantages Over Dentures or Bridges

Conventional bridges and dentures are not fixed to the bone and can, therefore, be unstable. This can make it difficult to eat or smile with confidence. Implants not only look more natural but feel and act more like regular teeth, with a stronger biting force. And because they don't directly rely on neighboring teeth for support, implants don't compromise the health of your natural teeth. Bridges are only expected to last seven to ten years, even less with root canals, whereas implants typically last a lifetime.

Post-Treatment Care

Consider your replacement teeth to be the same as natural teeth. They require the same daily brushing and flossing and the same amount of regular checkups. Like your natural teeth, the better you care for your replacements, the longer they will last.

Implant Services

Our implant services include:

• Sinus Lift Augmentation: Often, the sinuses will enlarge following the loss of the upper back teeth. This can preclude dental implant placement in the mouth's upper back areas since the sinus is an air-filled space, and dental implants need to be surrounded by solid bone. A sinus lift augmentation/graft is a surgical procedure that restores the sinus cavity to its original size and replaces the bone lost due to the enlarged sinus. This new bone graft typically takes nine to 12 months to heal before the dental implants can be placed into the grafted bone.
• Autogenous Bone Grafting: Occasionally, the ideal areas for dental implants do not have sufficient bone to support them. In these cases, it is often necessary to "borrow" bone from another area of your mouth and graft it into the deficient area. Often, the location of choice is from the chin or the back of the jaw where your wisdom teeth used to be.
• Implant Site Development: When a tooth needs to be removed due to infection, it is not uncommon to have lost bone around the infected tooth. In these cases, various types of bone grafting can be done at the same time the tooth is removed to facilitate the placement of a dental implant later.
• Computer-Enhanced Treatment Planning: We have special software on our computer that allows us to evaluate your dental CT scan in three dimensions for bone quality, bone quantity, and bone location, enabling the best possible placement of your dental implants. This also allows us to ensure an ideal result where your dental implants are concerned.
• Implant Maintenance: Once your dental implant restoration is completed, it is essential to keep the area clean and infection-free. Dental implants can accumulate plaque and tartar just as teeth can. Whether you have just one tooth replaced by an implant or several, a professional cleaning schedule will be necessary to keep your implants healthy. Your individual needs will determine the time interval for these professional cleanings.

Are you wondering if you are a candidate for dental implants? Schedule an implant consultation today. You can book your consultation online or request an appointment.