Category: Dental Implants

There’s good reason people often compare difficult tasks to “pulling teeth.” Without the right tools and medication, tooth extractions can be a nightmarish experience. However, the combination of modern medicine and experienced hands will ensure that your tooth extractions are relatively painless. But after you leave the dentist office after your extractions, it’ll be up to you to ensure that your extraction sites remain pain-free. Take a look at some of the aftercare tips your dentist will provide you to ensure that your discomfort is kept to a minimum after a tooth extraction.

Managing Pain after the Procedure

While you’ll get a better idea here about what to expect, your doctor will go over aftercare guidance during your appointment and will send you home with instructions so that you won’t forget any steps.

These are some of the instructions your doctor will leave you with after your tooth extraction:

·         Take your pain killers. Basic, over-the-counter painkiller should sufficiently mute the pain and will help keep down the inflammation.

·         Bite on the gauze covering the extraction site to help a clot form so that the bleeding stop.

·         Replace the gauze if it becomes to bloody. If the gauze isn’t enough to stop the bleeding, you’ll need to contact your doctor.

·         Ice the extraction site, applying a bag of ice to the area for 10- to 15- minute intervals

·         Skip the hot drinks, at least for the first day or two

·         Get plenty of sleep to promote healing

·         Keep your head elevated to keep the pressure off the extraction site and the clot forming there

What About Pain During the Procedure?

During the procedure, you won’t have to worry about any discomfort. You’ll be given a shot of a local anesthetic that will completely numb the extraction site. You’ll be able to feel pressure from the dentist’s hands, but nothing that qualifies as “painful.” And if you’re worried you’ll feel anxious during your procedure, talk to your dentist about IV sedation.

More on Tooth Extractions in Van Nuys, CA

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It isn’t too good to be true. Dental implants can restore your ability to eat foods that are too tough for those with failing teeth, or even conventional dentures. However, the benefits of dental implants don’t start and end with again enjoying foods you could no longer fully chew and enjoy. Take a look at all of the top benefits of dental implants, from enjoying good food again to smile confidently once again.

Comfort

Compared to conventional dentures or a mouth with a few failing teeth left, dental implants are much more comfortable – they feel much more natural.

Conventional dentures can agitate the inside of your mouth, especially when their adhesive breaks down and the dentures start to shift around in your mouth as you eat or speak.

Because dental implants are fused with the jawbone, they’ll stay in place and they won’t agitate soft tissue in your mouth.

Confidence

With your replacement teeth held firmly in place by dental implants, the back of your mind won’t be burdened by fears of your dentures sliding out of place while you’re talking or chewing.

Chewing

Even with a fresh application of an adhesive, there’s still often the fear of dentures coming undone while trying to chew through something fibrous and chew like French bread, fresh vegetables, or meat. With dental implants anchoring your replacement teeth, you can focus all your attention on the food and company instead of how the company will react to you struggling to eat your food.

Care

Caring for your new dental implants and replacement teeth will take just as much diligence as caring for natural teeth, but much less effort than maintaining conventional dentures.

There’s no need to fight with applying adhesives or to take dentures out to soak them at night. Simply brush, thoroughly, floss, and use a water flosser to clear out those hard-to-reach areas.

More on Dental Implants in North Hills, CA

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It’ll take a few days for the swelling and discomfort to pass, after having full arch dental implants placed. And for weeks still, your dental implants likely won’t have healed enough to support eat tough, chewy, fibrous food. While your diet may be limited until your dental implants heal, you can still enjoy good food in the interim. Take a look at these ideas for enjoying food right after having full arch dental implants placed in Lake Balboa, CA and Van Nuys, CA.

The Liquid Diet (1.5 to 2 Weeks)

Your liquid diet should begin as soon as you get home from surgery, especially if you had to fast in order to receive IV sedation or general anesthesia for your surgery. You’ll need to stick to a liquid diet for at least ten days, or as long as two weeks.

These are a few tips for actually enjoying the foods you consume while on your liquid diet:

·         Blend yogurt smoothies and mix protein into milkshakes for a filling, enjoyable meal.

·         Cook hearty soups and then puree them for easy consumption

·         Try to puree several components of your meal, instead of blending all components into one drink. This will give you a variety in flavor profiles

Progressing to Soft Foods (After)

After those first few weeks, your dietary choices will open up a bit more and you won’t be limited to things you can puree.

Take a look at these ideas for enjoying soft foods after transitioning from our liquid diet:

·         Sandwiches with soft breads that aren’t tough or chewy

·         Mix soft fruits into yogurt

·         Enjoy baked or mashed potatoes, elevated with light cheese and seasonings

·         Bake or broil fish until it’s flaky and delicate

·         Eat hearty pasta dishes once again, making sure the pasta is cooked beyond al dente

·         Feast on hearty, savory casseroles that have been cooked until the meat and vegetables are soft and tender

More on Full Arch Dental Implants in Lake Balboa, CA

Take time now to schedule an appointment with a local dentist to learn more about your options for getting full arch dental implants in Lake Balboa, CA.

It’ll take months to finally reach the day of your implant placement surgery. However, finally having your full arch dental implants placed isn’t the end of your journey. It’ll take months more for your dental implants to fully heal and their titanium roots to fully fuse with your jawbone. So in the days following placement, you’ll have to put extra care into your oral health to help ensure long-term success with your new teeth. These are some of the things your doctor will ask you to do after getting full arch dental implants in Lake Balboa, CA and Van Nuys, CA.

The Procedure

As you near the actual procedure, you’ll receive one last CT scan just to make sure that everything still looks good. During the same appointment, you’ll receive any supporting surgeries you may need – things like a tooth extraction to make way for the implants.

At the start of the procedure, you’ll be given a dose of a local anesthetic that will numb the implant sites. With the anesthesia active, you will feel no discomfort during implant placement. You won’t feel anything more than a mild amount of pressure as your dentist works.

The procedure itself is relatively quick. Your dentist will access the bone underneath your gums and then use a custom surgical guide. The guide will help your dentist quickly bore pilot holes into the jawbone and insert the titanium implant posts into the jawbone.

At the end of the procedure, you’ll be given a temporary restoration such a set of provisional dentures.

Aftercare

During the first few days after surgery, you’ll experience a bit of tenderness and inflammation at the implant sites. These are some of the things your dentist will instruct you to do to comfortably get through those first few days:

·         Take painkillers as directed

·         Keep your head elevated to help the implant sites clot

·         Avoid drinking through a straw, which could dislodge a clot

·         Ice the swollen area in 10- to 15-minute intervals

·         Get plenty of sleep to help expedite healing

More on Full Arch Dental Implants in Lake Balboa, CA

Reserve an appointment with a dentist at 818.Dentist to learn more about what you can expect ahead of getting full arch dental implants in Lake Balboa, CA.

Dental implants can give hope to those who had given up all hope for eating certain foods every again, and hope of smiling and speaking confidently without their replacement teeth sliding around. But severe bone loss can dash those hopes, especially if you’ve pinned your hopes of dental implants on a general dentist. An oral surgeon, however, can offer advanced solutions that can make your dreams of getting dental implants a reality. Take a look at what an oral surgeon can do to help you get dental implants.

Bone Grafting

It’s the top solution for helping a weak candidate for dental implants become a strong candidate.

A bone graft is performed by packing bone dust into the area where bone mass or density is too low to support dental implants. Over the months following surgery, the graft will be accepted by existing bone and will fuse together. This process usually takes at least four months. Ultimately, the bone graft will help existing bone generate new bone tissue.

Once the graft has healed, dental implants may be implanted in the area. And similar to the fusion of existing bone and the graft, the titanium roots of the dental implants will fuse together with the jawbone.

Some related procedures that can help make you a stronger candidate for dental implants includes the following:

Sinus lift – after severe bone loss has occurred, the sinuses may expand and sag, crowding space needed for implants. A sinus lift solves this problem by literally lifting the sinuses and using bone material to tuck them back.

Ridge preservation and augmentation – when a tooth is pulled, it may be necessary to fill the socket with bone material in order to stop deterioration. The ridge, the raised part of the jaw where teeth take root, can be reshaped after severe bone loss to accommodate dental implants and to restore facial symmetry.

More on Dental Implants in Van Nuys, CA

Reserve a time to talk with a local dentist and to find out more about your options for getting dental implants in Van Nuys, California. 

Anesthesia is a key ingredient in the dental implant placement process. With it, you might not remember much from your procedure. Without it, you’d probably want to forget all of the discomfort you’d encounter. Thankfully, local anesthesia is requisite for dental implant placement because it virtually numbs any discomfort you’d otherwise suffer through. Take a look at why dental implant placement is relatively painless and how it can make your dental implant journey memorable for all the right reasons.

Local Anesthesia

Besides a small amount of pressure, you won’t feel much during your dental implant placement procedure. That’s because at the start of your procedure, you’ll be given a dose of a local anesthetic that’ll numb just about all of the sensation at the implant site or sites. Even as your dentist carefully bores holes into your jawbone to make way for your dental implants, you won’t feel any pain.

Aftercare and Minimizing the Pain

Inevitably, there’s will be a bit of pain and swelling at the implant site in the days following your procedure. Here’s how you can minimize the discomfort and swelling:

Bite down on the gauze your dentist will give you. When the gauze becomes too bloody, replace it with more.

Apply a bag of ice to the implant areas, holding it there for about 15 minutes every 15 minutes or so.

Stick to the schedule. Take your pain medicine as directed by your dentist. Not only will the pain medicine mute any discomfort you may feel, it’ll also help bring down the inflammation at the implant sites and help speed up the healing process.

Keep your head elevated, especially during the first few hours after surgery, to minimize the pressure you put on the implant site as the area begins forming clots needed for healing.

Don’t spit or drink through a straw until the bleeding at the implant site has stopped, indicating that clots have formed.

Dental Implants in Lake Balboa, CA

Schedule an appointment with a local dentist to learn more about your options for getting dental implants in Lake Balboa, CA and Van Nuys. 

While effective, conventional dentures just don’t feel like natural teeth in the mouth. It’s a shortcoming based inherently on the design of conventional, adhesive-based dentures. Dental implants are a different story. Take a look at how dental implants work and find out just how close they can get to looking and feeling like your natural teeth looked and felt.

Why They Feel So Real

When natural teeth grow in, they take root in the jawbone to gain the reliability and stability needed to bite, chew and grind – day after day, year after year.

Dental implants feel like natural teeth because they’re designed to be implanted like natural teeth.

Take a look at the parts that compose a typical dental implant:

Implant post – typically made of titanium, the implant post is inserted into a tiny borehole carefully drilled into the jawbone.

Abutment – the abutment attaches to the top of the implant post and serves as a connector, linking the implant post with the dental restoration.

Dental restoration – this part is designed to look just like the natural tooth or teeth it’ll replace. Dental restorations include crowns, bridges and dentures.

Why They Look So Real

Beautiful, tooth-colored porcelain is commonly used in dental restorations to serve as replacement teeth. But it’s not just the shape and color of your replacement teeth that’ll make them look so convincing. It’s about what goes unseen.

Dentures affixed to dental implants won’t show any of the “tells” that clue people in that a person is wearing dentures. Here’s a look at some of the top reasons dental restorations attached to dental implants look so convincingly real:

·         They won’t limit what you can eat. The support from your jawbone will enable you to chew through chewy and fibrous foods like meat, sandwiches and fresh veggies.

·         They won’t slip out of place and distort your words or smile.

·         Depending on the style you choose, you may never have to take out your replacement teeth

Dental Implants North Hills CA

Take a moment to schedule a consultation with a local dentist to learn more about what you can expect from getting dental implants in North Hills, CA and Van Nuys.

When you treat them right, your full arch dental implants will reciprocate and treat you to many years of reliability. With regular dental care at home and check-ins with your dental staff, your full arch dental implants can last you the rest of your life.

Take a closer look at what you can do in the days immediately following your implant placement procedure, and in the long run, to keep your dental implants around for the rest of your life.

Aftercare Tips for Your Dental Implants

In the days following your procedure, you’ll have to manage mild to moderate bleeding and swelling at the implant sites. To do this, your doctor will likely prescribe a painkiller and a mouth rinse that’ll help prevent an infection from taking root.

Here are some basic guidelines you’ll be given for your first few days with dental implants in:

·         Use a sulcus brush to gently clean the implant sites

·         Take your pain medicine on schedule, even if you aren’t bothered by the mild discomfort. The painkiller your dentist prescribes will also reduce inflammation.

·         Apply ice to the implant site to bring down swelling and speed up healing

Routine Care Tips

In just a few days after your procedure, the swelling and tenderness at and around the implant site will subside. With the discomfort gone, or down to a minimum at least, you’ll be able to more thoroughly clean your mouth.

Here are some of the routine care tips your dentist will recommend:

·         Brush and floss daily, using a sulcus brush to clean tender and hard to reach areas of your mouth

·         Blast away leftover food particles in your mouth using a Waterpik

·         Rinse your mouth with an antibacterial mouth wash to get rid of any bacteria that survived your brushing, flossing and Waterpik

Full Arch Dental Implants San Fernando CA Take a moment to schedule an appointment with a local dentist to learn more about what you can expect from getting full arch dental implants in San Fernando, CA and Van Nuys, CA.