Restore Your Smile, Protect your Health!

Dentures are probably the first thing to come to mind when thinking of ways to replace a whole row of missing teeth. However, while regular dentures can restore your ability to chew and smile with confidence, they can’t stop the bone loss in the jaw that occurs when teeth are missing. That’s why at Winegar Dental, we’re proud to offer implant-retained dentures in Harker Heights, TX to help protect your oral health!
How Implant-Retained Dentures Work

While traditional dentures simply sit on top of the gumline, implant-retained dentures are supported by metal posts that are surgically inserted into the jawbone. These posts are naturally fused with the jaw through osseointegration; this way, they can secure the dentures firmly in place. Depending on patient preference, implants retained by dentures can either be permanently fixed in place or removable.

Candidates for Implant-Retained Dentures

The success of any treatment involving dental implants depends largely on your oral health. Bone grafts may sometimes be necessary to make sure the jaw has enough height for osseointegration to work. If you smoke, you’ll need to stop before and after the surgery; otherwise it could disrupt the healing process. You’ll need to speak with a dentist in Harker Heights to have your mouth evaluated in order to determine the best course of treatment.

What’s the Process for Getting Implant-Retained Dentures?

Depending on how many teeth need to be replaced, you can get full or partial dentures. At Winegar Dental, we’ll always use the minimum number of implants necessary to provide the right amount of support for your prosthetic. Usually, four to eight implant posts are necessary.

After an initial consultation, Dr. Winegar will schedule the surgery for placement. This is where the actual implants will be placed in your jawbone. Once healing is complete, a second surgery will be performed to place an abutment; after that, all that’s left is to place the actual denture. In certain cases, you can get Teeth-in-a-Day, which is where you receive your dentures on the same day as your implants.

Benefits of Implant-Retained Dentures

When you’re missing a tooth or multiple teeth, the bone no longer receives the benefits of chewing and gradually begins to resorb. In other words, it starts to deteriorate because it’s no longer needed. While traditional dentures have no effect on bone loss, dentures secured by dental implants in Harker Heights can give the jawbone the stimulation it needs to stay healthy.

There are other advantages of implant-retained dentures as well:

• They’re held in place by the implants, so they’re not prone to slipping.
• They provide chewing power comparable to that granted by natural teeth.
• With good maintenance and excellent oral hygiene, they can last a very long time.
• Since the dentures sit on implants below the gumline instead of directly on the gumline, it results in a far more natural-looking smile.  

Building a Beautiful New Smile with Four Implants

One of the biggest advantages of dental implants is their flexibility. An individual implant can take the place of a single tooth, but if you’ve lost all of your teeth at once, you can rebuild your entire grin with just four posts. And with All-on-4 in Harker Heights, you won’t have to wait too long before your new life with strong, beautiful implant-retained dentures begins. Do you think you’ll be needing a full arch of new teeth soon? Call Dr. Winegar today to see if you could be a candidate for All-on-4.

How Do All-On-4 Implants Work?

Like with any implant procedure, the goal of All-on-4 is to set sturdy, strategically placed roots that can support prosthetic teeth. In this case, four implant posts are used, and the two near the back of the mouth will be placed at a 45-degree angle. That puts them in contact with the areas of the jaw where bone density tends to be higher; as a result, they can usually bear the load of temporary dentures immediately after the surgery, and they can integrate with the rest of your mouth without the need for a bone graft or other preparatory procedures.

Am I A Candidate for All-On-4 Implants?

All-on-4 is used when an entire row needs to be replaced (usually because either most of the teeth are already gone or because they need to be extracted for healthy reasons). Certain oral health problems like gum disease can lead to implant failure, so Dr. Winegar will need to evaluate the state of your mouth first. She will also ask about other factors that could lead to complications, such as smoking habits. Note that even if you have already experienced bone loss in your jaw, it is often still possible to have All-on-4 dental implants placed.

What Are the Benefits of All-On-4 Implants?

• Improved Appearance: Without implants, your jaw and your overall facial structure could start to deteriorate, causing wrinkles to form. All-on-4 can stop bone loss and help you look younger.
• Varied Diet: You won’t need to avoid your favorite meals at home or in public anymore. Implants will let you chew all kinds of foods for better nutrition.
• Faster Results: Fewer implants means less recovery time, and you can receive new dentures in as little as a day.
• Easy Care: Daily brushing and flossing – in addition to regular dental checkups – will help you maintain your implants so that they can last for decades.

All-On-4 VS Traditional Dental Implants

For many patients, All-on-4 can greatly simplify the implant process. It can take 6 to 8 implants to anchor full dentures in place using traditional methods, and patients are far likelier to need a bone graft to make the procedure viable. Not only is All-on-4 more conservative in comparison, but it also reduces the amount of time you’ll spend waiting for your mouth to heal so you can move on to the next stage of the process. 

Failing Implants? We Can Help

Dental implants will let you eat anything you want, stop your jawbone from deteriorating, and provide your new teeth with a strong, stable foundation; we highly recommend them if you ever find yourself with a gap in your grin. But while implant surgery has a success rate as high as 95%, there is a risk, however small, of failure. At Winegar Dental, we can locate and treat the cause of implant failure, giving us a chance to save your smile! Contact us today to schedule an appointment with Dr. Winegar if you think your new teeth are suffering from complications.

Why Do Dental Implants Fail?

As rare as implant failure is, it can have a few different causes. One of the most common issues is a condition called peri-implantitis. When the gum tissue around the dental implant becomes infected, the bone underneath could break down. As result, the implant post becomes loose and might even de-attach from the jawbone altogether.

If you smoke or have diabetes, your odds of implant failure will be higher than normal. This is because they impede the body’s ability to heal itself; osseointegration (the process of the implant becoming one with the bone) depends entirely on the mouth healing properly.

What are the Symptoms of Failed Dental Implants?

Just as there are different reasons for an implant failing to join properly with your jaw, there are also different signs that such failure has occurred. In many cases, you’ll experience a radiating pain in the area around the implant post. If there’s an infection, you’ll probably see red or inflamed gums. Also, any difficulty chewing or biting could mean that your tooth is not as secure as it should be. Finally, if you can wiggle the implant post even slightly, it’s a sure sign of an issue that needs to be addressed as quickly as possible.

Keep in mind that implant failure can occur shortly after the surgery or several years later.

• Early Dental Implant Failure: Remember that there’s a difference between normal discomfort caused by surgery and the radiating discomfort caused by implant failure. If your pain lasts for more than a few days or grows worse, it’s better to be safe than sorry and call us right away.
• Late Dental Implant Failure: If your implant pain returns long after the procedure, or if you suddenly have trouble chewing foods that never gave you trouble before, you should consider it a possible sign of implant failure.

How Does Dental Implant Salvage Work?

The first step is to examine the implant site and take X-rays of your mouth in order to narrow down exactly what’s wrong with your implants. After that, we can start planning your treatment, which will be different depending on the source of your implant failure. For example, if the gums have been infected, we may be able to leave the implant in place while reducing bacteria levels with antibiotics and good oral hygiene. On the other hand, if a significant amount of bone has been lost, we’ll likely need to perform an advanced procedure such as bone grafting to help the jaw regenerate. In these cases, the implant might have to be removed. Once your mouth is healthy again, Dr. Winegar may be able to try and place a new implant.