Dentures vs. Implants: Preserves Your Jaw?

When it comes to replacement teeth, there are several dental treatments you could choose. The most popular, though, are dentures and dental implants. Both can restore your smile by giving you knew pearly whites fitted for your mouth. Even so, there’s a critical difference between them: only one offers patients jawbone preservation. To learn why that’s the case, read this summary on the issue from your Bristol dentist. It’ll help you pick the treatment that best meets your needs.

Why Do Missing Teeth Result in Bone Loss?

Normally, chewing with your natural teeth stimulates your jawbone to preserve it. However, that changes when you start suffering from tooth loss. Having missing teeth means the once-filled sockets in your jaw don’t receive the stimulus they did before. As a result, your body slowly breaks the jawbone down. Left untreated, this bone loss will cause a facial collapse that shrivels your face and ages your appearance.

This fact has been confirmed scientifically. For instance, an Indian Journal of Dentistry study found that up to 25% of the bone near a missing tooth can be lost a year after said tooth’s extraction.

Dentures Won’t Preserve Your Jawbone

Though they’re great dental prosthetics, dentures don’t preserve the jawbone.

The problem is due to how they function. Whether the partial or full model, they only rest against your gums and stay in place with adhesive or suction. That means they don’t provide much bite force and aren’t great for chewing tough foods. Consequently, they don’t generate the stimulus necessary to prevent facial collapse.

Actually, dentures might make that collapse more likely. Some research suggests they can increase bone atrophy, leading to substantial jawbone shrinkage.

Dental Implants Are the Better Option

In contrast, dental implants are the only prosthetic that can preserve your jaw over time. This ability stems from their unique traits.

Fundamentally, implants rebuild the entire tooth’s structure from root to crown. Dentists insert them directly into the jawbone itself, which causes them to fuse with the surrounding bone. Therefore, they’re firmly rooted enough in the previous teeth’ sockets to stem the bone loss. Plus, this state-of-the-art replacement choice won’t slip and can last over twenty years with proper care.

Compared to dentures, implants will do more to boost your oral health because they look and act more like natural teeth. Talk to your local dentist to see if the latter treatment could work for you.

About the Practice

Bristol Family Dental is based in Bristol, CT. As led by Drs. Christian, Katkowski, and Young, their team emphasizes comfortable dental care for all. In that spirit, they provide excellent preventive, cosmetic, and restorative dentistry, not to mention emergency dental treatments. This quality is complemented by advanced dental technology, which allows service to move quickly. For more information or to book an appointment, reach them at their website or call them at (860)-589-2794.