Disastrous Dentures! Reasons You May Want to Consider All on 4 Implants, PART 1

This two part article series presents compelling reasons why patients should consider dental implants as their tooth replacement solution instead of traditional removable dentures.

If edentulous (toothless) and near-edentulous people had any inkling of the trouble removable dentures can be, they’d very likely invest in having dental implants placed instead. This is an incredibly valuable lesson for all of us to learn before we make decisions that will harm our oral health and quality of life. When it comes to your oral health, no compromises should be made.

In this two-part series, we shall be discussing some very compelling reasons why you should choose All on 4 implants as your tooth replacement technology, and not removable dentures.

All on 4 Dental Implants and the Health of Your Jaw Bone

The roots of your teeth are essential to maintaining good jaw bone health because they transmit the forces associated with eating into the hard tissue that surrounds them. This keeps the bone ‘exercised’ and strong, thus preventing atrophication from claiming jaw bone volume. When teeth are lost, the underlying bone in the jaw undergoes a remodeling process due to the loss of this essential stimulation. Unfortunately, because dentures only replace the visible tooth structures (the crowns) and not the roots, they do nothing prevent atrophy. All on 4 dental implants, on the other hand, replace both the crowns and the roots of the teeth, keeping the jaw bone healthy.

The Consequences of Jaw Bone Loss

As the hard tissue in the jaw wastes away, patients will experience a weakened bite and the gradual aging and collapse of their natural youthful facial contours. The remodeling of the jaw bone is also what results in the need for patients to have their dentures refitted time and again, the costs of which add up in the long run. Eventually, the jaw will have become so weak and wasted away that it won’t even be able to support dentures.

At this juncture, dental implants in Houston will also be out of the question, thus leaving the patient without any tooth replacement options. This has a significant effect upon diet, which explains why one of the biggest problems faced by elderly denture wearers is malnutrition! In fact, wearing dentures can shorten your life expectancy by up to 10 years! If that’s not a good enough reason to opt for dental implants on the outset, I don’t know what is!

The Benefits of having Teeth that are Fixed and Non-removable

Never underestimate the quality of life you can enjoy when your teeth are fixed in your mouth and cannot be removed. Many of the challenges and repeat expenses that denture wearers are forced to contend with all stem from having teeth that are loose and can slip around in the mouth:

• Low confidence and poor self-esteem
• Unnatural smile aesthetics
• Difficulty eating and managing tougher foods
• Limited diet
• Repeat expenses, such as adhesives
• Having to take your teeth out at night
• Having to take your teeth out after meals to clean them
• Chronic bad breath as a consequence of dentures harboring food and bacteria
• Gums that are irritated and sore from being rubbed against

The All on 4 dental implant protocol can give patients a complete set of fixed and non-removable teeth that function, feel and look like natural teeth. This eliminates all of the typical above-mentioned problems, vastly improving a patient’s quality of life and self-confidence.

To read more about the benefits of All on 4 dental implants, stay tuned for the second half of this two-part series.

Dental Implant Houston News: The Development of the “All-on-4” Protocol

This article traces the development of the procedures used to give toothless patients a new set of non-removable teeth using dental implants.

Dental implants as we know them today have been around for several decades and for as long as they have, dentists have been trying to find a way to offer edentulous (toothless) and near-edentulous patients fixed tooth replacement solutions. The problem is, the more dental implants you surgically place, the more complicated the procedure becomes and the greater the chance of implant failure. Other problems include the cost of such a procedure, the physical toll it takes on the body and the amount of time it requires for patients to get a new set of teeth again. In the end, removable dentures - as uncomfortable and difficult as they can be to live with - just seem to be the better option!

Then, news of the “All-on-4” dental implant protocol was announced to the world.

In the Beginning, there was Osseointegration

In 1951, Swedish orthopedic surgeon - Per-Ingvar Brånemark - accidentally stumbled across the key that would lead to the conception of the entire field of dental implantology: ‘osseointegration’. It was during a clinical trial using rabbit bone that the professor noticed the complete bio-compatibility of titanium. Instead of being rejected by the body as most foreign materials are, the bone had actually biologically bonded to the surface of the titanium.

Eureka!

It wasn’t long after that the first dental implants were constructed from titanium metal and successfully used to replace teeth. As the years passed, ceaseless research and clinical trials expanded upon the academic understanding behind and practical application of dental implants as a tooth replacement solution. But still… while dental implant dentists could replace one or more missing teeth quite successfully, those who had lost all of their teeth faced a long and painful journey to oral rehabilitation.

Design and Development of “All on 4” Dental Implants

Just think about it: you have 32 teeth in your mouth; 28 minus your wisdom teeth. Can you imagine replacing every single one with dental implants? Can you image the scope of the surgery required to give an edentulous patient a complete set of teeth back?

Such a procedure just isn’t viable, so instead of replacing every single missing tooth with an implant, oral surgeons would use up to 10 dental implants per jaw to provide support for a non-removable prosthetic dental bridge (an artificial set of teeth). Yet still, 10 implants per jaw can require many separate surgeries to place and the expense of such an endeavor costs a considerable amount of time and money.

It was only in the early 1990’s that a protocol, which only required four dental implants per jaw to support a full set of replacement teeth, was developed and clinically tested. This protocol became termed the “All-on-4”. What further set this procedure aside from traditional dental implant procedures was that it was designed to, as far as possible, bypass the need for bone grafting surgery, thus saving patients many months of recovery, tens of thousands of dollars on the cost of surgery and a whole lot of pain and discomfort.

“All on 4” Implants, Here, Today

Nowadays, more and more dentists are receiving the necessary training in what is increasingly becoming regarded as a fundamental rehabilitative dental procedure. And when you consider that All on 4 dental implants in Houston are able to give people a brand new set of teeth in as little as a single day, with a single surgery and at costs that are an average $25,000 lower, it’s no wonder why!

All on 4 Dental Implants in Houston: 21st Century Solution to Tooth Loss

This article provides an overview of the “All-on-4” dental implant protocol and its benefits over traditional removable dentures.

Periodontal or gum disease is a pervasive ailment today, in spite of our advanced medical technology and increased health awareness and standards of hygiene. According to the American Academy of Implant Dentistry, more than 30 million people in the United States have lost all of their original adult teeth in one or both of their jaws. And the most common cause of rampant tooth loss and edentulism (the state of having lost all of one’s teeth) is gum disease.

The traditional approach to replacing missing teeth, especially in cases where most of your teeth have fallen out or have been extracted by the dentist, is removable dentures. But these bulky plastic dental appliances and all of the challenges and repeated expenses they come hand-in-hand with have been eclipsed by a far more sophisticated and non-removable technology:

Dental implants and in particular, the “All on 4” protocol.

About Modern Dental Implant Procedures in Houston

“All on 4 dental implant protocol” may sound complicated and full of medical jargon you don’t think you could understand, but the procedure is actually very simple in concept! A specially-trained implant dentist places four dental implants in the mouth, which are used to support a non-removable prosthetic dental bridge (refer to the picture above). This bridge is fabricated from exceptionally strong, durable and non-corrosive materials so that it can endure many decades of chewing, grinding and biting with little risk of breakage.

Furthermore, because the bridge is supported by dental implants, which are in turn anchored by the jaw, it doesn’t need to be big and bulky like removable dentures do. This eliminates many of the challenges patients experience with dentures, such as gagging, sore gums, impeded taste ability and impeded texture and temperature sensation.

The Benefits of All on 4 Dental Implants in Houston

Nowadays, removable dentures are no longer the best option edentulous and near-edentulous patients have. You no longer need to follow in the footsteps of mom and dad as far as getting new teeth is concerned. If you have lost most or all of your teeth to the ravages of periodontal diseases, your smile quite literally has a second chance. All on 4 dental implants in Houston can provide fixed and non-removable tooth replacement solutions that enable patients to eat all the foods they like while enjoying the many benefits of having a natural-looking and confident smile.

Because All on 4 dental implants are non-removable, they are cleaned and maintained like natural teeth and don’t require any of the repeat expenses that dentures do, such as messy, sticky adhesives, overnight soaking solutions and special cleaning pastes. The “All on 4” dental bridge is also custom fabricated to fit snugly against a patient’s gums, which prevents it from harboring food debris and bacteria: a common problem with dentures that leads to chronic bad breath.

All on 4 Implants: Fact, not Fiction

With typically only a single surgery of a few hours only, you can go from toothless to having a mouth full of fixed, non-removable and gorgeous-looking pearly whites. This may sound very much like the stuff of dreams, but it is a reality thanks to the incredible advancements that have been made in the fields of fixed oral rehabilitation and dental implantology!