How dental implants can end your denture misery

Dental implants provide patients who currently struggle with loose or ill-fitting dentures with a more stable solution. At Kent clinic the Centre for Aesthetic Periodontics and ImplantologyLimited (CAPI) we offer a full range of dental implant treatments, including the option to use implants to stabilise your dentures in a procedure called implant overdentures or denture stabilisation.

Common problems with dentures are caused by resorbtion of the jaw bone. This is a side-effect of tooth loss and happens when the tooth roots are missing for any period of time. Because standard dentures only replace the crowns of missing teeth, they do nothing to prevent this problem. When the jaw bone shrinks, your dentures will get looser, and you may experience problems:

• Eating anything but soft foods, thus issues with getting adequate nutrition
• Speaking clearly
• With comfort if your dentures rub your gums (called “denture sore mouth”)
• With confidence to socialise if you fear your teeth might escape from your mouth.

Using dental implants to stabilise your dentures will help to avoid all of these problems, or rectify them if they have already occurred. At CAPI in Kent we have highly-skilled Specialist Periodontists and Specialist Prosthodontists who can treat even the most complex of cases where some degree of bone loss has already occurred.

Stabilising your dentures with dental implants involves a surgical procedure, carried out here at our modern Kent dental practice under either local anaesthetic or conscious sedation, depending on your personal treatment preferences.

The good news is that you seldom need as many dental implants as teeth. Your Kent implant dentist will undertake precision planning prior to your surgery, meaning that a full arch (jaw) of teeth can usually be supported by between four and eight dental implants.

After a healing period, during which most people continue to wear their regular dentures, new dentures will be attached to abutments on top of your dental implants. With good aftercare and regular visits to your Kent dentist, your implants could last for the rest of your life.

You will once again enjoy:

• Being able to eat what you like
• Clear speech
• No fear of your teeth falling out