Losing a tooth quickly impacts your life in more ways than one. While the esthetic effect on your smile is apparent, the functional loss of missing teeth can add much more difficulty to your daily life. Everyday activities you once took for granted become hard, such as enjoying your favorite foods. You may take certain items out of your diet to prevent harming the sensitive socket in your smile. Because we use our teeth to articulate speech, our voice alters and may be quite noticeable to others. Dental alignment degrades as neighboring teeth shift toward the open gap. You even become at higher risk for tooth decay and gum disease as the additional force on your remaining teeth wears away the protection of your enamel. Since gum disease is the primary cause of missing teeth among adults, a single loss can increase your chances of losing even more. Fortunately, we could design a dental bridge to close the gap in your smile and restore your beautiful appearance.
At your Ankeny, IA, dental office, we combine attention to esthetics and function to design custom prosthetics that restore missing teeth. A dental bridge provides a nonsurgical method for regaining your bite while preventing shifts in your alignment. Maintaining proper alignment helps prevent joint disorders that occur when your jaw must strain to compensate for your dental loss. When you fully understand the benefits of your prosthetic options for tooth loss, you can feel confident about repairing your smile!
How We Lose Our Teeth
We suggest visiting our practice for routine cleanings and exams biannually to best preserve your smile. The primary reason for your preventive checkups is to prevent the accumulation of bacterial deposits that wear away your enamel and cause gum disease. Left to grow, plaque can eventually lead to the need for extracting teeth that lose enough healthy material for restoration with a filling or dental crown. Similarly, these deposits irritate your gums, causing them to recede, which allows periodontal infection to reach your jawbone. As the body’s inflammatory process eats away at gum and bone, your teeth become unstable, leading to tooth loss.
Restoring Your Smile
When you visit our practice, we will take careful measurements of your oral structures to design a custom bridge that fills the gap between missing teeth. If you have multiple adjacent dental losses, we can restore them with a single treatment. After placing your bridge, we will inspect it at subsequent checkups to see if it holds in place.
Talk To Your Ankeny, IA, Dentist About Replacing Your Tooth
Exploring your options for dental prosthetics means regaining your smile! If you would like to find out more about replacing missing teeth, please contact your Ankeny, IA, dentist’s office at (515) 207-6182 to schedule a visit.
