Essential Services in Dental Implant Clinics
A dental implant is a surgical component that interfaces with the bone of the jaw or skull to support a dental prosthesis such as crown, denture, bridge, facial prosthesis or to act as a orthodontic anchor. Intraoral defects such as missing soft or hard structures of the jaw and palate are restored by using a dental prosthesis. An intraoral means the inside of the mouth in which restoration occurs. An area in dentistry that specializes on dental prostheses is prosthodontics.
Aiding of speech, improve aesthetics and rehabilitating mastication these are the functions of dental prostheses. Holding of one place by connecting to teeth or dental implants by suction or being passively held by surrounding muscles is how the dental prostheses are positioned. Fixing of the dental prostheses is that it can be permanent or temporarily fixed which has a lot of variations.
Use of dental adhesives or screws to attach to the teeth or dental implants is done by dental prostheses that are permanently fixed. The process of removing dental prostheses includes; using friction against parallel hard surfaces that undercuts the adjacent teeth or dental implants, suction using the mucous retention and also by exploiting the surrounding muscles and anatomical contours of the jaw to passively hold it in place.
Orthodontic anchors are dental braces which are used to straighten teeth and help position them with regard to a person’s bite while aiming to improve their dental health. Not only does braces straighten teeth and help position them with regard to a person’s bite but they also correct under bites, overbites, open bites, deep bites, cross bites, crooked teeth, malocclusions among other flaws of the teeth and jaw.
Aside from assisting in shaping the teeth and jaws the combination of other orthodontic appliances are used to help widen the palate or jaws and they can be found as cosmetic or structural braces. A biological process that is used as a basis of modern dental implants is osseo- integration. Materials such as titanium are used to form an intimate bond to bone. Osseointegration is the direct structural and functional connection between living bone and the surface of a load- bearing artificial implant. The application of osseointegration include the following; eye-borg perceive color through sound waves, bone anchored hearing conduction amplification, retention of the craniofacial prostheses, dental implants, bone anchored limb prostheses and knee and joint replacement.
When osseointegration is carried out an amount-able period of time is required for healing before either the dental prosthetic is attached to the implant or an abutment is placed which holds the dental prosthetic. An implants position is determined by the position and angle of adjacent teeth through lab simulations or using computer tomography with CAD/CAM simulations and surgical guides called stents.