Dr. Robert Thein's Implant Dentistry Blog

Hi, I am 22 years old and I have an impacted cuspid. My orthodontist today said we will see the progress of the tooth movement next month and if no progress, we should look into other options. I currently am on my parents’ insurance but will get kicked off in July. There is no way my parents could afford a dental implant. Would a dental bridge or partial denture be an option for me such as the Encore Bridge?

Kristin from Virginia

Kristin,
There are a whole range of options for replacing a single missing tooth.

A dental implant is the nicest way, and the most expensive. That way you wouldn’t have to do any alterations to the adjacent teeth, and it would be solid and feel like your own tooth.

A dental bridge is also nice. And as you have noticed on the website, there are a couple of types of bridges. A conventional bridge is the most durable option, but you would have to put crowns on the adjacent teeth.

You could maybe have an Encore Bridge. There aren’t many dentists who know how to do those, and whether or not it would work would depend on how much stress there is in your bite at this position in your mouth. The Encore Bridge can break, and a canine tooth tends to have to take quite a bit of stress. I would go to an expert cosmetic dentist for that type of bridge, for certain.

And there are a variety of removable partial dentures. These aren’t as comfortable in your mouth, because they rely on clips or clasps to hold them in. But they are considerably less expensive. The sturdiest ones have a metal framework, and these also tend to be the most expensive of these inexpensive options. An intermediate type would be a Valplast partial–made of a flexible plastic that has plastic clasps fitting around some of your teeth to hold it in. The simplest one would be a plastic plate that snaps into place on the roof of your mouth and holds a replacement tooth. This type is often called a dental flipper. It’s not very sturdy, and you probably would have to remove it to eat, but it looks realistic, would help you have a normal appearance, and it would keep the teeth around your missing tooth from drifting into that space and making things really complicated to fix later on.

Costs may vary widely for the dental flipper. But I’m guessing you could get one in Virginia for a couple hundred dollars, as a very rough ballpark estimate.

Read more about affordable Los Angeles dental implants

My husband’s front left tooth is missing. It came out after he bit into an apple. The right front tooth almost looks brown in color. We’re not sure what needs to be done to correct the problem that won’t be costly. Please help.
- Marcy from Georgia

Marcy,
I’m not sure I fully understand your husband’s situation. If his front tooth completely came out from biting an apple, he may have serious gum disease which would need to be treated in order to save the remaining teeth. And you mentioned the other front tooth is almost brown. I’m wondering if that is an isolated tooth that differs from the others in color or if all his teeth are that brown. So I’m not sure what to suggest for treatment.

But for replacing a single front tooth, there are several options, some of which are quite affordable. The simplest would be what is called a dental flipper. This is made of a single acrylic tooth that is placed on a pink acrylic base and made to snap into the roof of your mouth. This might cost 1/10 th what a fixed bridge would cost.

A fixed dental bridge involves covering the two adjacent teeth with porcelain crowns and suspending a false porcelain tooth between them. It can be made to look very realistic. Another option is to place a dental implant. This might cost a little more than a dental bridge, but it is more conservative in that it doesn’t require anything being done to the adjacent teeth. And if the adjacent teeth have been seriously weakened by gum disease, as I suspect, this may be a better option for you. We have a page on our website that compares a dental bridge vs. an implant.

My suggestion would be to find a dentist with expertise in both cosmetic dentistry and implant dentistry, who would be able to give you an honest evaluation of all these options, and develop an affordable treatment plan for you.

I have a molar that is decayed below the gumline and both my dentist and the endodontist say it can’t be saved. How long after the tooth is taken out do I have before I have to get an implant?
Rosemary from Oklahoma

Rosemary,
When a tooth is taken out, it only takes a couple of weeks for the teeth around it to start drifting into the space. The teeth on either side begin to tip into that space, and the opposing tooth super-erupts into the space also. These are natural tooth movement forces that help keep our teeth touching their neighbors and help it so that your teeth all meet when you bite. When there is a missing tooth, those movements cause problems and can lead to serious bite discrepancies, headaches, and TMJ disorder. And it can be very costly to correct this if it goes on too long.

A dental implant is an excellent choice to replace your missing tooth. If the tooth is infected, I wouldn’t place the implant until the infection is gone. I would give the socket a little time to heal and then place the implant.

But then the implant needs time to integrate with the bone–usually several weeks. If the false tooth is placed on it too soon, it puts the implant at risk. So in the meantime, you should wear some type of temporary tooth. A simple resin tooth mounted on pink acrylic (called a flipper) works well to hold the space. Then, once everything is healed, you can have the permanent tooth placed.

Links to check out: check our complete Los Angeles dental implants website.
Read the pros and cons of a dental implant vs a bridge.