Missing teeth aren’t only an aesthetic concern, but they also threaten the delicate health of your smile. Exploring restorative options promptly is key to avoiding putting your overall health at risk, but patients often dislike the idea of waiting several months while their implant heals. If that’s your case, Teeth in a Day® is a revolutionary option that can cut down your waiting times.
Teeth in a Day® reduces the time needed between implant placement and the final tooth restoration. Without requiring lengthy treatment, they are a quick and effective way to restore your smile in a single day, giving you back your confidence and dental function. Here’s all you need to know about this procedure.
Understanding Dental Implants and Their Benefits
Dental implants are a restorative dentistry procedure for replacing one or several missing teeth. Unlike dental bridges or dentures, implants aim to imitate a natural tooth’s structure by placing an artificial root in the jawbone. This offers unparalleled benefits, such as durability, stability, and a seamless blend with surrounding teeth.
To understand how this works, it’s important to break down the implant’s structure:
- A titanium metal post that’s surgically inserted in the jawbone. Titanium is a biocompatible material, meaning that it can blend in with your bone in a process called osteoporosis, ensuring a tight fit.
- An abutment that connects the metal post with the prosthetic tooth.
- A customized dental crown, designed to match your surrounding teeth in shape, color, and length.
Bone Density Loss and the Importance of Implants
Nowadays, several restorative dentistry options are available, many with much shorter treatment times than implants. However, nothing can stop or even restore the jawbone density loss that happens in your jaw after losing a tooth.
It’s not widely known that teeth provide stimulus, nutrients, and minerals to the jawbone. When you lose a tooth, the jawbone starts to recede, focusing its nutrients in a different area that receives more stimulation.
This process happens fairly quickly. Studies indicate that during this period, the alveolar ridge—the part of the jawbone that holds the teeth—can experience a reduction in width ranging from 29% to 63% and a decrease in height between 11% and 22%.
While bone resorption is a natural outcome, it can have several consequences for oral health. The density loss can lead to skin sagging, wrinkles around the lib area, and an overall older, sunken appearance.
Besides aesthetics, as your bones receive, the surrounding teeth may shift due to the diminished jawbone. This could even lead to further tooth loss. For that reason, it’s recommended that teeth be replaced as soon as possible, especially with dental implants, to maintain the jawbone's density and prevent further degradation.
The Traditional Implant Placement Process
As you can see, implants stand out among other restorative dentistry options because they blend in with your jawbone. However, for that reason, the implant placement process can be lengthy and intricate. Here’s a breakdown of the basic steps of traditional implant surgery:
- Initial Evaluation & Planning: The process starts with a dental exam, during which your dentist or oral surgeon will assess your oral health. During this visit, they will evaluate your oral health, review your medical history, and take X-rays or 3D imaging to determine bone density and gum condition. If bone loss is detected, bone grafting or sinus augmentation may be necessary before implant placement.
- Implant Placement Surgery: Once your mouth has been deemed healthy enough, your oral surgeon will schedule a date for surgery. During it, a titanium post (implant) is surgically inserted into the jawbone. This procedure is similar to tooth removal and is done under local anesthesia.
- Osseointegration: After the titanium post is inserted, it’s necessary to wait 3 to 6 months while the material integrates with your bone. This process, called osseointegration, is crucial to the integrity of your implant.
- Abutment Placement: An abutment is attached once the implant integrates with the bone. The gum tissue around the abutment may take a few weeks to heal. In the meantime, a dental lab creates a custom crown to match the surrounding teeth.
- Dental Crown Placement: Once the area is healed, the customized crown is attached to the abutment, completing the restoration.
As you can see, the dental implant placement process involves several stages and typically takes 6 to 12 months to complete, depending on the patient's oral health and healing response. However, many patients don’t have that much time to wait for their desired restoration.
The Teeth in a Day® Procedure
Teeth in a Day® is a revolutionary dental implant technique that shortens treatment times. As the name indicates, by shortening the time between implant placement and the final replacement of lost teeth, patients with missing or failing teeth can restore their smile in a single day.
The Teeth in a Day® process starts similarly to a common implant procedure, with an initial consultation and detailed assessment. However, on the day of surgery, after the dental implants are carefully placed within your mandible, we’ll attach customized temporary teeth. These are set firmly in place, allowing you to leave that day with a functional smile.
You will have follow-up appointments following your Teeth in a Day® procedure to assess your progress and make any required modifications. Your permanent teeth, which are specially made to fit your particular smile, will be delivered to you following the initial healing phase.
This allows you to restore your ability to chew, speak, and smile confidently immediately. Moreover, because the Teeth in a Day® procedure involves fewer surgical interventions, it also has shorter healing times.
Restore Your Smile Immediately with Teeth in a Day®
Implant dentistry has become a reliable and effective solution for tooth replacement, with a high success rate when proper care is taken. However, if you’re looking for an alternative that will allow you to enjoy a full smile quicker, Teeth in a Day® may be your treatment.
At Butura Oral and Dental Implant Surgery, we understand that the prospect of dental surgery may feel scary. Still, we want all our patients to experience the unique benefits that only dental implants can offer. We will do everything in our power to ensure your comfort every step of the way, so reach out today and recover your full smile!
