For years, edentulous patients were forced to turn to dentures in Chicago as their only option for tooth replacement. Unfortunately, dentures have a long list of disadvantages. They lose their fit over time and repeatedly slip out of place. They can be uncomfortable and feel quite unnatural, and dentures require an ill-tasting adhesive that isn’t always effective.

Now, patients who are missing an entire arch of teeth can visit this oral surgeon for a better alternative. This oral surgeon in Chicago can place between four and six dental implants to anchor a denture in place.

The support of dental implants offers a major benefit for denture wearers. The implants function like the missing roots of the teeth. This prevents a process known as resorption, which results in the loss of the jaw bone over time, from taking place.

Conventional dentures, on the other hand, do nothing to stabilize the jaw, which eventually wears down, shrinks back and changes shape as a result. Those changes in the bone cause the denture to lose its fit over the course of several years and require patients to have new dentures repeatedly fabricated.

Implant-supported dentures have a host of other appealing features, as well. Implant-supported dentures have minimal effect on speech and allow patients to maintain a more varied diet than their traditional counterparts do. These appliances offer a more natural appearance and they feel more like biological teeth, too. Patients with implant-supported dentures also have more confidence in the knowledge that their dentures won’t slip out of place at an inopportune moment.

Of course, dental implants need sufficient bone material to facilitate the osseointegration process (forming a bond with the surrounding bone). In the vast majority of cases, this oral surgeon can place the dental implants in the remaining bone available in a denture wearer’s mouth. However, in patients with significant bone loss, sinus augmentation or other bone grafts may be needed before the dental implants can be placed.

If you are facing an extraction of all of your upper or lower teeth or if you have been wearing dentures for some time, discuss implant-supported dentures with Dr. Steven Koos, your oral surgeon serving Chicago, to determine if they would be a better choice for you.