Our practice can provide a wide range of dental services. We also work in cooperation with caring specialists in the area to provide our patients the best treatment options. This flexibility saves you time and keeps your total dental care within one practice. Our emphasis is on total preventive care for our patients. Total care begins with regular hygiene visits, regular checkups and continued home oral health routines.

Our practice also provides the highest-quality services for restoring mouths that have been damaged by dental disease and injury and common problems that require cosmetic dentistry. Our primary goal for our patients is to achieve and maintain optimum oral health through advances in techniques, technologies and by maintaining their scheduled dental exams.

Crowns and Bridges

Crowns

A crown is a permanent covering that fits over an original tooth that is either decayed, damaged or cracked. Crowns are made of a variety of different materials such as porcelain, gold, acrylic resin or a mix of these materials. Porcelain generally has the most natural appearance, although it is often less durable.

The treatment plan for a patient receiving a crown involves:

• Numbing the tooth to remove the decay in or around it.
• Building up the tooth structure after the decay removal.
• Preparing the tooth to provide an ideal fit for the crown.
• Making an impression of your teeth in order to create a custom-made crown (usually takes two weeks).
• Making a temporary crown and fitting it onto the tooth during the interim period when the permanent custom-made crown is being created.
• Applying the permanent crown (when received from the lab) by removing the temporary crown and fitting the permanent one onto the tooth.
• After ensuring that the crown has the proper look and fit, the dentist cements it into place.
• This process generally consists of 2 visits over a 2 week period.

Once the procedure is completed, proper dental hygiene, including daily brushing and flossing, is required to maintain healthy, bacteria-free teeth, gums and crowns. This helps in the prevention of gum disease. Given proper care, your crowns can last a lifetime.

Bridges

A bridge is a dental device that fills a space that a tooth previously occupied. A bridge may be necessary to prevent:

• Shifting of the teeth that can lead to bite problems (occlusion) and/or jaw problems and resultant periodontal disease.
• Bridges safeguard the integrity of existing teeth and help maintain a healthy, vibrant smile.

Implants

Dental implants are artificial tooth replacements that were first developed half a century ago by a Swedish scientist named Per-Ingvar Branemark. Implants arose from the patient’s need to secure loose-fitting dentures. Since the advent of the implant, engineering and enhancements to the implant have enabled dentists to expand the implant’s usefulness, including the replacement of missing or lost teeth. Today, implant techniques provide a wide range of tooth replacement solutions including:

• Single Tooth Replacement
• Anterior Replacement
• Posterior Replacement
• Full Upper Replacement

Types of Implants

There are three main types of implants:

• The root implant
• The plate form implant
• The subperiosteal implant

The root implant—by far, the most popular—is the most effective because it mirrors the size and shape of a patient’s natural tooth. This implant is often as strong as the patient’s original tooth. The implant or artificial root is placed into the jawbone under local anesthesia, then allowed to heal and integrate with the bone. Once the healing process is completed and the jawbone is attached to the implant, the patient returns to the dental office where the implant is fitted with the new tooth. This process generally takes anywhere from three to eight months.

The plate form implant is ideal in situations where the jawbone is not wide enough to properly support a root implant. The plate form implant is long and thin, unlike the root implant, and anchors into thin jawbones. It is inserted the same way as a root implant. In certain cases, the plate form implant is immediately fitted with the restoration without waiting for the healing process to run its course.

The subperiosteal implant is used when the jawbone has receded to the point where it can no longer support a permanent implant.

Implant As a Treatment Option

If the missing tooth space has no surrounding teeth, the dentist may decide an implant is the most appropriate treatment choice or option.

The treatment plan for a bridge usually requires two trips to your dentist. Specifically, it involves:

• Numbing the surrounding teeth with a local anesthetic and cleaning plaque or decay.
  Reducing the teeth so that the crowns can be fitted.
• Making a mold or impression of the teeth in order to create a customized permanent impression (this generally takes 2 weeks).
• Fitting the patient with a temporary bridge until the permanent bridge is ready for placement.
• Removing the temporary bridge and replacing it with the permanent one.
• Adjusting the bridge for the proper bite and fit and permanently bonding it into the mouth.

Post Implant Care

Although proper oral hygiene is always recommended for maintaining good dental health, it is especially important when a patient has received a dental implant. Bacteria can attack sensitive areas in the mouth when teeth and gums are not properly cleaned, thus causing gums to swell and jaw bones to gradually recede. Recession of the jawbone will weaken implants and eventually make it necessary for the implant to be removed. Patients are advised to visit their dentists at least twice a year to ensure the health of their teeth and implants. Dental implants can last for decades when given proper care.

Fillings

The concept of a “filling” is replacing and restoring your tooth structure that is damaged due to decay or fracture with a material. We will replace old, broken-down amalgam/metal fillings that contain traces of mercury with white fillings (composites) to restore your smile and teeth to a more natural look and feel.

With today’s advancements, no longer will you have to suffer the embarrassment of unsightly silver fillings or metal margins of the past. Eliminate the dark, black appearance in your teeth with new-age, state-of-the-art, tooth-colored resin or porcelain materials.

Comparing White Fillings Versus Silver Amalgam Fillings:

• White fillings bond to the tooth; they strengthen the tooth by restoring most of its original shape. Silver amalgams, on the other hand, may weaken the teeth and make them more susceptible to breaking. Broken teeth can be very expensive to replace; tooth colored can actually save time and money in the long run.
• White filling composites are preferred by most patients. This is due to the natural color, strength and overall appearance and feel. Composites are naturally more comfortable.
• Restorations with composites require less removal of tooth, less structure to place than those with amalgams and especially with new cavities. Dramatically smaller holes are needed with a composite.
• Silver amalgam fillings contain traces of mercury.