Missing teeth can affect you in a lot of ways.
They can leave you feeling embarrassed or ashamed of your smile. They can make it difficult if not impossible to eat many foods.
And losing teeth can affect how you speak as well, which is something that is less amusing when you are 60 than when you were 6.
You don’t have to feel embarrassed or frustrated with your lack of teeth, however. You can visit our dentist office in New Albany, IN, instead. Through our restorative dentistry, we have helped patients from all over the United States rebuild their smiles.
Part of the reason we can do this is because we offer both standard and mini dental implants. We’ll explain why that makes a difference below.
If you are ready to learn more, contact us by calling (812) 945-7645 or by filling out our online form.
A Little History About Dental Implants
Dental implants are prosthetics for the roots of your teeth. Just like a prosthetic hand or a prosthetic foot, dental implants are meant to replace a part that is missing.
The way modern dental implants came about was a bit of an accident. Dr. Per-Ingvar Brånemark, a Swedish doctor, was doing research on blood circulation when he made a discovery that changed restorative dentistry.
Dr. Brånemark had placed titanium cylinders in the leg bones of rabbits as part of a research study. When he tried to remove the cylinders, he found that the bone had bonded directly to the titanium.
We don’t know what happened to the rabbit research, but we do know that Dr. Brånemark placed the first set of dental implants in a human patient in the 1960s. Since then, others have built on his groundbreaking findings to make teeth replacements better than it has ever been.
How Dental Implants Help
Before dental implants, dentures were about the best you could hope for if you were missing all your teeth or a whole row of teeth.
Since dentures were not anchored in place, they could slip out of place when you were eating or just talking to someone. And the longer you have dentures, the more likely they are to slip.
Dental implants address this by creating a direct connection between your dentures and your jawbone. After your implants embedded in your jaw, we can attach your dentures to the implants. The makes your dentures much more secure and stable.
Just as important, it helps to restore the power behind your bite. With implant-supported dentures, you can eat practically anything that you could before you lost your teeth.
In a real sense, implant-supported dentures don’t just restore the appearance of teeth in your mouth. They also restore the function of your lost teeth as well.
The Kinds Of Dental Implants
Standard dental implants work great for many but not all patients.
The reason for this is that your jawbone will begin to shrink when you start losing teeth. Without roots to press into your jaw, the bone does not create new tissue to replace old tissue. Over time, this leads to a smaller jaw (which also explains why traditional dentures become looser with time).
If you replace your missing teeth relatively soon after losing your teeth, then you may have enough bone to support standard dental implants. If you wait too long, your jaw may not be able to support full-size implants.
This may not be an issue if you come to New Albany Implants because we also offer mini implants for our patients.
Mini implants have a smaller diameter than standard implants. This allows us to place them where standard implants won’t fit.
You will also want to know that mini implants have been proven to provide comparable benefits to standard implants. Both can secure your dentures and restore your bite, and both can provide the stimulation your jawbone needs to maintain its shape.
You Can Trust Our Experience
Dr. Ron Receveur, the founder of our New Albany, IN, dentist office, has placed thousands of implants for hundreds of patients. He knows what to look for when examining your jaw, and he knows how to determine what kind of dental implants will work for you.
To get started on restoring your smile and more, contact us online to schedule a consultation or call us at (812) 945-7645.