Leslie,
Some tooth extractions can be traumatic enough that you can have serious pain afterward. The pain you’re telling me about doesn’t sound abnormal, except for one thing, and that is what your dentist told you. You’re having a much different experience from what your dentist led you to expect.

I don’t know if the difference comes from a lack of experience of your dentist in predicting what to expect afterward or if there is something wrong, like the infection has gotten deep into the tissues. Dentists are smart, when they give post-operative instructions, to paint a picture of a worst-case scenario, so that you won’t worry when that happens. But it sounds like you are experiencing problems way beyond what your dentist was expecting. I would recommend you call your dentist, tell him or her what you are experiencing, and address the problem. It may need a return visit to the office, or it may be that you just need some prescriptions for pain medications and possibly antibiotics.

Other links: read about dental implant surgery.

Jen,
If you have multiple missing teeth, dental implants are clearly the way to go. When you are missing just one tooth, the choice isn’t as clear-cut.

Yes, if the teeth on either side of the missing tooth don’t have large fillings and are otherwise fine, it seems a shame to grind them down to do a bridge. Placing a bridge means you have to grind these teeth down and put crowns on them, so I agree that the dental implant is the nicer way to go. But all the many years before dental implants became popular we used to place bridges for these situations, and they worked fine. So if you can’t afford the implant, that is a consideration, too.

When a dental implant is placed for a front tooth, the dentist will make some type of temporary false tooth for you to wear now, until the implant is placed, healed, and ready for the permanent false tooth.

Links: read more about the choice between a dental implant and a bridge.

I very much appreciate the response. The dentist is now having a new denture made free of charge.
- Lori from Nevada

Click here to read the original posting about a cheap implant denture.

Laila,
Gum disease is an infection, and some people may think that it can be solved with antibiotics, but it can’t, and here’s why.

A key feature with gum disease is the accumulation of hardened deposits on the teeth, above the gum, but mostly below the gum. These deposits, called calculus, are hardened plaque, and the plaque is hardened by drawing minerals from your saliva and gingival fluid. Besides being a irritant themselves, the deposits harbor destructive bacteria that are continually producing toxins that help destroy the attachment of your gums to your teeth and the bony support of the teeth.

Since the bacteria in these deposits don’t have access to your bloodstream, you can’t kill them with antibiotics. You get rid of them by physically cleaning the teeth. That is why antibiotics won’t cure gum disease, though sometimes they can speed healing after a deep cleaning.

It is similar with infected teeth. The normal body defenses don’t work inside your tooth. The tissue wants to swell in order to accommodate an influx of antibodies and white blood cells. But since it is in a confined space, when it tries to swell, it chokes itself and dies. This dead tissue then has to be physically cleaned out and the inside of the tooth sealed – we call that a root canal treatment.

Other links:
Read about removable dentures.

Louis
Yes, if your existing implants are solid, it is possible to put a permanent denture in over them, with some possible exceptions. Or, if there is a problem with old implants, a new dentist can remove them.

To use your existing implants, they need to be well-placed. Your new dentist will probably want to examine them carefully with a CT scan, to make sure they are in good quality bone and not poking through to some inappropriate place such as a sinus cavity. And if you keep the existing implants, it could affect your range of options for the overdenture. But if the implants are well placed and solid, your new dentist should be able to work around them and construct an implant overdenture using them.

He got his new implant dentures a couple of years ago, but he continues to have trouble with them. 8 top teeth have fallen out in about 2 yrs. Some of the same teeth have fallen out. Sometimes his dentist just “cements” the tooth in himself and sometimes he sends the whole denture back to the lab for repair. When he sends the dentures back, it is sometimes 3-5 weeks before my father can get his permanent denture put back in because he has skin growth (which has to be cut off) over the implants and has to wear healing caps. This is painful for my father and also hard on him since he has to wear the temporary dentures that he hates.

My question to you is this: Does 8 teeth seem excessive to you? It seems very excessive to me. My father paid a lot of money for this and it is getting harder and harder for him to go thru this. I tried speaking with his dental office, but they pretty much brushed me off. I have been waiting 3 days for his dentist to call me back. They basically told me the only thing they can do is send the denture back and have the lab “make sure” the teeth are firmly in place. They should have done this when the teeth were created, let alone the 3-4 times they have already been sent back. I would like them to make a new top set, but they said they would charge us for that and that the lab does not have the mold anymore. I am considering going to another dentist/implant center to get him a new set. What would you recommend? Thank you very much for your time.
- Lori from Nevada

Lori,
I think you’re telling me that the teeth are separating from the base of the denture. If that’s the case, yes, eight teeth coming out in two years is excessive. Even one tooth coming out is unusual, and after having two or three teeth come out, I would have insisted that the denture be remade.

There is a lot of pressure on dentists that do dental implant work to cut corners to save money. There are a lot of people out there who are price shopping implant dentists, and so you get dentists using inferior materials, cheap laboratories, and short-cut techniques, in order to get the costs down. It’s a real problem because of all the areas in dentistry, implants are possibly the most demanding, with the potential for the most serious complications.

The poor quality of the implant denture is probably the doing of the dental laboratory, but it is the dentist who selects the laboratory and who is ultimately responsible for making this right with the patient.

Links:
Read more about dental implant failure and affordable dental implants.

Followup – After she went back to the dentist with this information, the dentist agreed to have the denture remade for no charge. Click the link to read her reply.

Susan,
The problem with your son getting dental implants at age 16 isn’t a health issue, but could be a cosmetic or functional issue.

The problem is that he is still growing, and will be until he is maybe about 19. And what happens is that if the implants are placed before his jawbone starts growing, his natural teeth will move with his growth, because they are attached to the bone with a ligament. But the dental implants are solidly anchored in the bone, so they won’t move with his growth. And since you are talking about front teeth, that difference in height will become an esthetic problem.

I would recommend that your son wear a set of temporary teeth. This can be done with a simple dental flipper. He can start wearing that now. It will likely last until he is 19, and at that point the implants can be placed. Then, while he is waiting for the bone to grow around the implants and make them solid, he can continue to wear this flipper and do so until the final teeth are placed on the root form fixtures.

I hope this is helpful.

Links:
Read about what makes a person a candidate for dental implants.
Read our page comparing dental implants to dental bridges.

But I don’t have a lot of money, and I’ve heard about mini implants and wonder if that would work for me. I want teeth that look natural and will stay in my mouth permanantly.

Thank You,
Shelly from Indiana

Shelly,
If your teeth can’t be saved, then you have two choices – complete dentures, or dental implants.

Mini implants are appealing to many people, because they’re advertised as cheaper. They do save a little money, but they simply aren’t very strong. Since they don’t have much diameter, they don’t have much holding power in the bone. The best you could do with mini implants is to stabilize a denture – so you would still have a denture, but it would stay put a little better.

If you really want teeth that look natural, and enable you to chew naturally and they will stay put permanently, then dental implants is the way to go. If you want to save money, you do fewer implants. While a dentist could maybe put in eight implants in the upper arch and eight more in the lower, and that would make for a really nice, stable result, you could stabilize your teeth quite well with only two implants in each arch, and that would cut the cost down to 1/4.

My recommendation is to find a dentist in Indiana who is highly qualified in implant dentistry, and who will listen to your budget concerns and work with you to tailor a plan for affordable dental implants.

Other links:
Read about the best toothpaste.

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

Thank You
- Marion from Pennsylvania

Marion,
You’re smart to be looking at dental implants when you are missing all your teeth. Just getting a removable denture will lead to a gradual loss of jawbone until in ten or twenty years you become a dental cripple with facial collapse.

The number of dental implants will vary from patient to patient and will depend on the condition of your mouth and your budget. Be very wary if you go to an implant dentist and they tell you that there is only one possible solution. When it comes to dental implants, there are always a variety of ways to replace all of your teeth.

I’m not sure what you mean by attaching to your other teeth. If you have good teeth left, you don’t need a full upper and lower. But yes, implants can be combined with your natural teeth in various ways.

As far as which dental implants are the best, there isn’t one “best” brand. Rather, there are several good companies that make quality implants. Pick a reputable implant dentist, and they will be sure to use only quality components. If you look for the cheapest dentist, you leave yourself vulnerable to low-cost implant components that don’t fit quite exactly and may come loose after a few years. Look for a dentist with credentials (either fellowship or diplomate status) from either the International Congress of Oral Implantologists, or the American Board of Oral Implantology. Those are the two most prominent organizations that provide credentials to implant dentists. Or, you can look for training at the Misch Institute, which is a premier training facility. Unfortunately, the American Dental Association hasn’t made implant dentistry a recognized specialty yet, but finding a dentist with one of these credentials will help assure you of getting quality care.

I hope this is helpful.

Other links:
Read about how to pick the best implant dentist.