A dental implant consists of a crown and a root, similar to a natural tooth. Our office places the root portion of the dental implant and your restorative dentist will place the crown portion of the dental implant about 3 months later. Considerable thought is given prior to dental implant surgery concerning placement of the proper width and length of the dental implant. This is based on the amount of alveolar bone height and width as well as the bone density.
A dental implant is placed so the crown of the implant is in an ideal functional and aesthetic position. Frequently the implant can be placed at the same appointment as the removal of the tooth that is being replaced. Sometimes, however, the extraction site will require a bone-graft procedure prior to the placement of the dental implant. If this is done, then the dental implant is not placed for about 3 months to allow adequately dense alveolar bone to fill in the tooth socket.
Several recent National surveys have shown that dental implants have greater than a 95% success rate. Furthurmore, dental implants cannot develop tooth decay as can a natural tooth used to support a bridge. Dental implants require similar oral hygiene maintenance as your natural teeth. Our office spends considerable amount of time reviewing oral hygiene techniques with patients.
The dental implant will have osseointegration (bonding of the titanium dental implant to bone) after dental implant surgery. We use MIS and Nobel Biocare dental implants. A hole (osteotomy) is prepared in your jaw bone to the desired width and depth. The osteotomy is then threaded so that the dental implant can passively be placed into the prepared site. A healing abutment is placed over the dental implant so that a second surgical procedure will not be necessary. We do minimally invasive flapless dental implant surgery.
