If you’re missing teeth, it’s probably obvious to you what lacking them means on a day-to-day basis. It can substantially degrade your confidence in yourself, making basic acts like eating and talking much more difficult and anxiety-inducing than they would be otherwise.
For people in this position, dental bridges can be their saving grace. They’re a strong, beautiful way to replace teeth, affording you a smile that you can easily take pride in. If you’re near Chelsea, the team here at Healthy Smiles Dental Care would be happy to show you what this treatment is capable of.
Dental bridges consist of one or more false teeth that are pressed together, then are attached to either the surrounding teeth or the jaw itself. These false teeth are typically made from some variety of ceramic, giving them incredible durability and a realistic look.
There are two types of dental bridges that we offer, distinguished by how they’re adhered to the smile. We offer both traditional and implant bridges to our patients, and we will be happy to help you figure out which one is best for you when we meet you in person.
Traditional bridges are attached to teeth surrounding the gap in your smile and make use of small dental crowns in order to do this. This allows the false teeth a fair amount of stability without the need for surgery.
Dental implants are small metal posts that are surgically placed into the jaw. False teeth can be attached to two or more dental implants in order to create an implant bridge. This affords the dental bridge increased stability and durability, even compared to traditional braces.
Having a gap in your smile can seriously dampen your confidence, in addition to affecting your health in a variety of ways. It’s possible for the surrounding teeth to move to fill in the gap, causing severe misalignment of your teeth.
Dental bridges can prevent these issues from becoming serious down the line, restore your bite power, and give you confidence that you might have been missing since you lost those teeth. If that sounds appealing, give us a call and we’ll be happy to talk to you about what they can do for you.
Dental bridges are adhered in place with sophisticated dental cement, allowing them to remain in place for years after their placement. However, this means that dental bridges cannot be removed at will; you would need the help of a dentist to take them out.
If you’re interested in a removable prosthetic, you may want to ask your dentist about getting partial dentures instead.
A dental bridge can be used to replace anywhere from one to four teeth, though the more teeth you replace the more stress you’ll naturally place on the restoration. For that reason, they’re best-suited to replacing one or two teeth.
Implants can improve the stability of your dental bridge, so if you’re interested in replacing three or four teeth you may want to make use of them.
Our dental bridges are made from materials that look a lot like the natural teeth. However, they lack the natural pores that are on the surface of your actual teeth, which means that whitening solution cannot penetrate into them. Professional teeth whitening is therefore ineffective on them. You’ll therefore need to be proactive about keeping your teeth white if you have dental bridges.
There’s usually a small gap between your dental bridge and your gums, and cleaning in that gap is important in order to prevent the development of gum disease. Thankfully, there are several ways that you can do this.
For one, you could make use of a floss threader. This is like a dull plastic needle that can make it easier to push dental floss into small gaps, like those under your bridge.
Then there are interdental brushes. These are similar to small plastic toothpicks and are capable of slipping under the prosthetic in order to brush away plaque.
If you’re interested in a more high-tech option, you might want to invest in a waterpik, which can use pressurized water to blast away plaque deposits in the mouth.
