Learn About The Benefits of Restoring Your Smile With Dental Implants

What are the Benefits of Restoring Your Smile with Dental Implants

At Blossom Smiles Dental, we understand that sometimes unfortunate events take place that make us lose a tooth or two, or even more; events like car accidents, sports accidents such as a knock to the face with a puck or a ball or even a walking accident that goes horribly wrong. Other habits such as clenching or grinding, nail biting or using teeth like tools could lead to fractures of teeth and ultimately their loss. Whatever the reason may be, losing a tooth or more can have long term effects on our health and overall wellbeing. This is why it is important to always consider replacing any missing teeth, for health reasons, function and cosmetic appearance. Let me further explain some of the effects of loosing teeth. 

Missing teeth cause bone loss 

What that means is that when a tooth is missing and not replaced, our bodies get rid of the bone where the tooth used to sit. From our experience with some of our patients visit the dentist here in Burlington, when we compared their x-rays before and after a tooth extraction we notice significant bone loss, specifically during the first year after the extraction. This is supported by the clinical research and findings done over the years by dentists which states that the process of bone loss is almost 10 times faster during the first year alone than the next 10 years. This makes future replacement of the missing tooth more complicated and limits our options. Too much bone loss may make placing an implant less possible without more extensive surgeries. 

Missing teeth can cause cosmetic and speech changes

This is especially true when front teeth are lost and these teeth are not replaced. Certain letters cannot be pronounced with missing front teeth,  and could cause impediments. This is beside the obvious change in a person’s look with a missing front tooth. This is why at Blossom Smiles Dental in Burlington we always recommend replacing a lost front tooth with dental implants.

Missing teeth change the shape of the face 

When back teeth are lost, the cheeks tend to sink in giving a longer more sunken face shape. When multiple back molars are lost and the teeth aren’t replaced, the whole vertical dimension of the face collapses very quickly giving the patient an old aged look and may affect one’s self confidence. Therefore, replacing back teeth with implants restores that dimension once more.

Missing teeth reduce food chewing and cutting efficiency

This means that with missing teeth that are not replaced by implants by our dentists, one would not be able to properly bite and chew the food before swallowing, which leads to the ingestion of whole pieces of food. This tends to overload our digestive system and may lead to other health problems that can be avoided by having a tooth replaced by an implant. 

In conclusion, one of the best ways to restore missing teeth is with implants. We don’t recommend using an implant for every missing tooth, but rather meeting with your dentist in Burlington to discuss your oral health and coming up with a proper treatment plan, customized to your individual needs is the best course of action to take control of your oral health and cosmetics.