At Creditview Dental in Mississauga, your dentist may use dental implants to fill unsightly and unhealthy gaps from tooth decay, periodontal disease, traumatic injury or congenital absence of teeth, so you can have a complete and functional smile.
Do you feel alone in your oral health problems? Well, you shouldn't! The Canadian Dental Association reports that while tooth decay and tooth loss have decreased over the past 40 years, they still occur. In other words, many North Americans have smile gaps from tooth decay, periodontal disease, traumatic injury or congenital absence of teeth. At Creditview Dental in Mississauga, your dentist may be able to fill unhealthy gaps with dental implants so you can enjoy a functional smile.
The Dental Implant
Dental implants not only look and act like a real tooth, but they also help preserve the jaw by exercising the bone every time you bite and chew. This happens by what dentists call osseointegration, a process whereby human bone bonds to the titanium implant screw. Titanium is the metal that most effectively attracts bone.
Additionally, dental implants may be placed in multiples to support dentures and bridges or they may attach to metal rods inserted into the jaw. Either way, dental implants are known to be stable and to last for decades.
Qualifying for Dental Implants
Dentists may recommend dental implants to patients who have healthy gums, sufficient bone in their jaws and good overall health. Visual inspection and X-rays provide the information needed to make an informed decision about tooth replacement.
If you decide on dental implants, the staff at Creditview Dental will try to make oral surgery as comfortable as they can. Typically, patients need only a local anesthetic as the dentist opens the gums and inserts the titanium implant into a pre-drilled hole in the bone. After some weeks of healing (and osseointegration), the site is ready for the metal abutment, which extends above the gum line, and a lifelike porcelain crown.
Denture patients will find it useful to know that Creditview Dental offers mini-implants (MDIs) as well. Inserted in multiples, these devices are about half the size of standard implants and require less bone to be functional. They provide stability for full dentures, allowing patients the potential to enjoy their favourite foods without adhesives or slippage.
