Why dental implants last for a long time

When even one tooth is not in the mouth, the shape of the smile and even the whole life becomes ugly. Missing teeth have been always an uncomfortable situation. When smiling and speaking, the first thing that appears is teeth. So even missing one tooth especially the front teeth can’t be ignored at all!

Missing teeth has been a very common problem that people suffer from it but now it has effective cures. These treatments are dental bridges, partial or complete dentures, and dental implants. Among all of these treatments, dental implants have shown the most durability, beauty, and effectiveness.

Reports and patients’ satisfaction with this treatment proves that dental implant is the first choice of dentists to replace the missing tooth and restore the patients’ smile to its natural beauty. However, a dental implant is one the most expensive and time-consuming procedures in dentistry so the durability of the implanted tooth has been a concern for all time and patients need to be sure that their new tooth works for them for a long time.

Here’s why dentists highly recommend dental implants rather than other replacing missing teeth treatments.

Dental implant parts are just like natural teeth

A dental implant has three main parts:

Fixture

The fixture is a metal screw-shaped which plays the role of the root of the tooth and is placed in jawbones where the root of the missed tooth was already. The dentist will put the fixture under the gums by surgery.

Abutment

The abutment is a metal or tooth-colored material connecter that connects the fixture and false tooth together and helps the artificial tooth to sit on the fixture.

Prosthesis

Prosthesis looks like and functions just like a natural tooth and also the material in it is the same as natural teeth.

As you can see, dental implants components have this obligation to be and function just like natural teeth and also to be as comfortable as the real teeth. Now for more clarifying, let’s show you what exactly dentists do and how they put these parts together to build an artificial tooth that functions like the natural one.    

The main advantage of dental implants over other treatments

The main difference between dental implants and other treatments is providing artificial root that keeps the false teeth in place and that’s why the new tooth lasts for a long time. At first, the dentist will screw the fixture (also named pins) in the gums by surgery. Then gums begin to accept these fixtures instead of the root of the missing teeth by time.

Depends on the condition after 3 to 6 months, gums have a new root that will not get loose easily. After these months and after dentist approval, the abutment will be cemented or screwed to the fixture and at last artificial crown sits on the abutment. As you can see every step of this treatment proves that the new tooth structure is completely similar to the natural tooth and it is going to last for a long time and also helps patients to eat and talk as convenient as they were before.  

Dental implants need strong jawbones

But what happens if they are not strong enough? Will applicants be restricted? No! Nowadays because of the lack of proper nutrition, bones become less dense and make a condition called osteoporosis that affects the jawbones too. Bone loss can be diagnosed through full mouth X-rays (OPG or panoramic x-rays).

Thanks to the major progress in dentistry patients who suffer from bone loss of the jaws especially elderly patients can have implants but through the supplemental treatment called “bone grafting”. During this treatment, a piece of bone from another part of the patient’s jaw or body will be removed and then transplanted into the jawbone. After this and several weeks of recovery, the jaw is ready for the pins of implants and the rest of the treatment will be resumed.

Dental implants last almost for the rest of your life

The first thing to know is that nothing lasts forever and a dental implant is no exception. However, reports and results have shown that the implanted teeth will last for 25 years which is a very satisfying result for a treatment. This shows that this treatment is worth the money and time you spend on it. Also by some factors, the life span of the implanted tooth will be increased like:

• Do the oral hygiene routine for the implanted teeth as well as natural teeth like brushing twice a day, flossing and using mouthwash every night.
• Take good care of them like not opening bottle lids with teeth, not chewing very hard things or food and also take visiting dentist 2wice a year seriously.
• Choose a skillful dentist. There are two important points to an implant’s success: to know whether the pins of implants are completely absorbed to the jaw or not and if the patients need bone grafting. These two factors can be diagnosed just by a skillful expert.