Transforming smiles and lives: FAQs about dental implants, designed like natural teeth to fill gaps
Implants are transforming the way dentists like our own Drs James J. Kreuz, Gregory J. Duffner, and Alex J. Dolinar rebuild and replace missing and lost teeth. When a tooth cannot be preserved despite our best efforts, the team at Park Avenue Dental Care in Homewood, Illinois, may explore ways to promptly rebuild your complete, attractive, and highly functional smile with implant-supported crowns, bridges, or dentures.
Dental implants are titanium roots, that are replaced with in the jawbone to resemble a tooth or group of teeth. A screw is inserted through the gums and into the jawbone. A porcelain crown is then attached to the screw to become the new tooth or teeth. They can be used to support dental prosthesis including crowns, dentures, and bridges. Today’s treatments are so natural looking, no one will know you had surgery. There’s approximately a 95% success rate for all implants. With modern advances in dentistry, some implants can be restored immediately with life like all porcelain crowns. For more details ask your dentist.
What are implants?
Implants are cylindrical-shaped posts designed to function like artificial tooth roots to support a dental crown, bridge, or denture.
How do implants support crowns, bridges, and dentures?
One implant may be surgically positioned in the jawbone to support or retain a single crown for those individuals who need to replace one tooth. A few strategically placed implants may also be secured in the jaw to stabilize a dental bridge. This option is appropriate for patients missing a few or many teeth. For those individuals who need to replace an entire upper or lower arch full of teeth, dentures can be held in place by a minimal number of dental implants.
How are implants placed?
Our dentists are proud to work with some of Chicagoland’s best specialists. We coordinate with them to plan and design your new teeth. Once the implant is placed in your jawbone during a simple surgical procedure, it will fuse with the surrounding tissue as it heals. This healing process, osseointegration, provides a solid platform for the prosthetic crown that is placed by our dentists. The crown is attached to the implant, which is a part of the jaw. The implant now functions as a tooth root to securely stabilize it. Due to this unique design that “mimics” the structure of natural teeth, implant-supported crowns, dentures, and bridges also promote the strength of the bone in the jaw. The jaw remains strong due to the stimulation it gets from the function of the prosthetic teeth connected to it by way of implants.
How long do implants last?
Because implants keep the jawbone strong, the destructive process of bone resorption is avoided. This process, characterized by the loss of bone in the jaw, leads to changes to your facial structure and shape. As these changes take hold, traditional dentures that simply conform to the shape of the surrounding tissues no longer fit as well as they once did. So, it is necessary to adjust and even replace these dentures continuously. With implant-supported dentures and other prostheses retained by implants, you can enjoy healthy function for a lifetime without the need to replace your appliance. This makes implants a great long-term value and investment in your smile and health.
Plus, Park Avenue Dental Care works closely with individuals from across the Homewood, IL area to prevent threats to their implants; notably, those threats are presented by inflammation of the tissues around the implant (since restorations do not decay like natural teeth). With good professional care and oral hygiene at home, this gum disease-like damage does not have to be in your future, and you can enjoy your implant restorations for life. Call us at (708) 798-6868 today with specific questions and to learn more.
