DENTURE
2 appointments needed. May require additional appointments for adjustments. A denture is a removable appliance that replaces all your upper teeth and/or your lower teeth once they have been extracted. Dentures are made from an acrylic base with resin or porcelain teeth. Dentures: Dentures and removable partials are our most difficult procedures. Please plan on returning to Amazing Dental Care for adjustments, in some cases we have seen patients return for multiple adjustments. To reduce the need for adjustments, please bring a package of cracker sandwiches (Keebler or Ritz filled with Peanut butter or cheese). If you eat after you get your dentures, you will feel spots that rub. These spots will cause a blister. If we can make adjustments while you are at the office, it may save a return trip. Bone loss and dentures Dentures can accelerate bone loss by wearing away at the ridges of bone they are placed on. Every time you bite down or clench your teeth you are placing pressure on the ridge, resulting in its resorption. This is a primary cause of continual problems on getting dentures to fit, of sore spots and difficult or painful chewing. People who wear dentures can experience another severe consequence of bone loss: collapse of the lower third of their face. The loss of the ridge bone brings your chin closer to the nose, causing your jaw to jut out and your nose appears to stick out further because your upper lip has puckered in. Deep wrinkles appear around the mouth and the cheeks develop “jowls”— sagging skin. This facial collapse can appear to age you by many years! Preventing bone loss Bone loss can be prevented by giving the jawbone a replacement tooth with a root that can exert the same or similar pressure as natural teeth. This is done immediately after extraction by replacing single teeth with dental implants, or by using a fixed implant-supported bridge or denture. A single-tooth implant or a dental bridge with three to four teeth supported by two implants provide a chewing power of 99% of natural bite force. A denture secured with dental implants, such as our Same Day Teeth procedure, provides about 70% to 80% of normal biting force and helps considerably in preventing bone loss. GETTING USE TO YOUR DENTURE It will take a bit of time to get use to your new denture, particularly if it’s your first. They should, however, become comfortable and functional with time. Make an appointment as soon as you develop any sores, change in fit, or any other problem you would like us to address. SPEAKING: At first you will have some difficulty with speaking and this is to be expected. Some people describe this as trying to talk with a “mouth full of marbles”. Be patient; you will quickly adapt with practice and soon you will find you cannot speak properly without your denture. There is no way to predict how long this will take, each patient adapts at a different rate. EATING: Eating takes practice as well. The important thing to remember is that you do not chew with your denture as you did when you had teeth. Natural teeth chew in an up and down motion. Denture teeth, on the other hand, use a side to side motion to mash down the food. Always cut your food into small pieces for more effective denture chewing. It is unpredictable how well you will adapt to eating. Some patients chew just about anything whereas others find they are limited in how well they can chew. All patients, however do improve with practice, time, and a bit of patience. Give them a break. Take your dentures out before going to bed. "The mouth tissues can recover from wearing them during the day," says Dr. Lewis West, a Toronto dentist. If taking your dentures out at night is not an option for you, then be sure to remove them for six to eight hours at another time of day. Soak your dentures in warm water if they have metal clasps. If they don’t, you can use either a half-vinegar, half-water solution. Soaking will help to remove stains, plaque, tartar and bacteria. Denture Fit: Your denture will “settle in” in a short time and should fit well.
Good quality control is critical to ensure the denture fits and looks natural in the patient's mouth. No two dentures will be alike; even two sets of dentures made for the same person will not be exactly alike because they are manufactured in custom molds that must be broken to extract the denture. After the molding process is completed, the fine details of the denture are added by hand. This step is necessary to ensure the teeth look natural and fit properly. The quality of the denture's fit can be controlled in two ways. Relining is a process by which the sides of the denture that contacts the gums are resurfaced. Such adjustments are necessary because the dental impressions used to make dentures cause the gums to move. As a result, new dentures may not fit properly. Also, over time bone and gum tissues can shift, altering the fit of the denture. Rebasing is used to refit a denture by replacing or adding to the base material of the saddle. This process is required when the denture base degenerates or no longer extends into the proper gum areas. Most patients require relining or rebasing approximately five to eight years after initial placement of the dentures. Bone Loss: Acrylic teeth are preferred for people who have bone loss in their jaws or unhealthy gums. Chewing puts pressure on the dentures, which transfer that force to the bones underlying the gums. Constant force can change the underlying bone, which can affect the bite, or occlusion of the dentures. If the dentures do not meet properly when you bit down, the unbalanced pressure may cause further damage to the bone. Porcelain transfers that force with greater intensity than acrylic teeth. Acrylic also transfers less pressure from habits such as grinding, clenching, or tapping teeth. Wear: Porcelain is a harder substance than acrylic, making porcelain teeth more durable. Because porcelain teeth resist wear, these dentures preserve the normal jaw movements and alignment for a longer period. Acrylic teeth are susceptible to abrasion. Acrylic teeth are less likely to break or develop fractures. Acrylic dentures may be a better choice than porcelain if you need only a partial. Porcelain vs. Acrylic: Acrylic dentures are quieter, like natural teeth, whereas porcelain teeth ma cause a “clacking” sound during chewing. Acrylic and porcelain dentures require regular checkups to ensure proper fit, although acrylic dentures will wear sooner. Tooth loss is unpleasant to face, but well fitted partial or full dentures can be indistinguishable from our natural teeth. Dentures are available in several types of materials, including porcelain, acrylic resin and composite resins with porcelain an acrylic resin being the most common. Selection of the most appropriate material for your needs involved careful consideration of wear, durability and maintenance. Denture Base: Full (or “complete”) dentures are always made of acrylic. In a pink gum color. Sometimes, however, they may have metal palate that fits into the roof of your mouth for extract strength. This is made of a lightweight alloy called chrome cobalt. This is extremely strong and helps to prevent cracks developing the denture. A chrome cobalt palate is normally used where a person tends to have problems with an upper denture breaking regularly. In most cases, this can happen where the person still has all their own natural lower teeth but has lost all the upper teeth. In this situation, you can still bite with quite a strong force with the lower teeth, sometimes enough to create cracks in the acrylic of the upper denture, which eventually breaks. The chrome cobalt palate is strong enough to resist this. HOWEVER, the metal palate does not fit quite as snugly as a 100% acrylic dental palate. This means it does not stay in place quite as well as a full acrylic denture. Lactone base offers strength that you would great from a chrome cobalt palate. Lucitone is a unique high impact denture base. It is excellent for color atability and accurate and excellent fit to model. Lucitone is the industry’s leading denture base family, setting the standard for over 4 decades. Denture Cleaning Instructions Daily-mild hand soap and soft brush For more serious staining problems: 1 teaspoon of water softener (Calgon) 1 cup of water (at least 8 oz) Allow them to soak in this solution for 15-30 minutes then rinse thoroughly prior to placing the dentures back in your mouth. Avoid using other powdered household cleansers, which may be too abrasive. Also, avoid using bleach, as this may whiten the pink portion of the denture. |
