Root planing
A dental implant

Alternatives to Immediate Dentures

What are your alternatives to immediate dentures?

Some of the alternatives to an immediate denture may be:

• Having periodontal therapy, root canal treatment, and bridges or partial dentures to keep your teeth
• An overdenture
• Implants
• Delaying treatment Keeping some teeth

Periodontal therapy may be an alternative if there's still enough sound bone around your teeth. Therapies such as root planing or gum surgery might allow you to keep your teeth.

Root canal treatment may also allow you to keep your teeth. Root canal treatment is used to treat infections of the nerves of teeth. A crown can then be placed to strengthen and protect the tooth.

After periodontal or root canal treatment, bridges or partial dentures could then be used to fill in the spaces.

Overdentures

An overdenture looks the same as a regular denture, but it's placed over specially prepared teeth. Retaining teeth helps preserve the bone in the jaw.

Implants

An implant is a small titanium cylinder that is placed into the bone of your jaw. It replaces the root of a missing tooth. An implant with a restoration placed on it could be used to fill in spaces. Implants can also help hold a new denture in place.

Delaying treatment

Unless you're in a lot of pain, you might decide to leave your teeth as they are, at least for now. But delaying treatment can be a risky alternative. If your teeth and gums are infected, they will never heal on their own. They'll just keep getting worse. Infections of the teeth and gums can lead to further tooth loss and can drag down your body's immune system, affecting your entire body.

Immediate denture
A dental implant being inserted
Partial denture

Alternatives to Overdentures

What are your alternatives to overdentures?

Some of the alternatives to an overdenture are:

• An immediate denture
• Implants
• Partial dentures
• Delaying treatment

Immediate denture

Taking all of your teeth out and making an immediate denture may be an alternative to an overdenture.

Implants

An implant is a small metal cylinder that's surgically inserted into the bone of the jaw to replace the roots of missing teeth. Implants would make your new denture much more stable, and they also slow the bone loss that occurs after teeth are removed.

Partial denture

Another alternative to overdentures is using the remaining teeth to anchor a partial denture.

Delaying treatment

Unless you're in a lot of pain, you might decide to leave your teeth as they are, at least for now. But delaying treatment can be a risky alternative. If your teeth and gums are infected, they will never heal on their own. They'll just keep getting worse. Infections of the teeth and gums can lead to further tooth loss and can drag down your body's immune system, affecting your entire body.

Choosing overdentures

Whenever teeth are removed, the bone in your jaw begins to recede. If we leave some of the roots of the teeth in place and place an overdenture,we can slow bone loss significantly and give you a more stable denture.

A bridge
A dental implant being inserted
Full dentures

Alternatives to Partial Dentures

What are your alternatives to partial dentures?

When you've lost one or more teeth, you have several alternatives to partial dentures:

• Bridges
• Implants
• Full dentures
• Delaying treatment

Bridges

In some cases, bridges are an alternative to partial dentures. A dental bridge is attached to the teeth next to the space, and those teeth hold the bridge in place and provide support.

Implants

Sometimes, when we don't have enough teeth to place a bridge or when we don't want to reduce adjacent teeth,we can solve the problem by placing an implant. A dental implant is a small titanium cylinder that's surgically inserted into the bone of the jaw to replace the root of a missing tooth. Then a crown, bridge, or denture can be attached to the implant.

Full dentures

Removing the rest of your teeth and making a full denture might also be an alternative.

Delaying treatment

If you still have your teeth and you're not in a lot of pain, you might decide to leave your teeth as they are, at least for now. But if you have infected teeth and gums, delaying treatment can be a risky alternative. Infected teeth and gums never heal on their own. They'll just keep getting worse. Infections of the teeth and gums can lead to further tooth loss and can drag down your body's immune system, affecting your entire body.

Partial dentures

Sometimes when you're missing teeth, a partial denture is simply the best alternative to fill in spaces and keep you chewing effectively. There are several kinds of partial dentures, and we can work with you to choose the right one for your situation.