Dr. Rohinton Patel and his team at Hawaii Pacific Dental Group place implant-supported dentures as a permanent alternative to removable prosthetics. Because the restoration is fixed, patients do not have to worry about a slipping denture while eating or speaking. Dr. Patel can take a series of high-resolution digital images to guide surgery so that the procedure is minimally invasive.
When patients are missing several teeth and are looking for a fixed option where they don't have to remove dentures to replace their teeth, a technology called implant-supported dentures are oftentimes utilized to give that patient great function and an esthetic improvement. As well, it increases the patient's quality of life by helping them eat and speak far more functionally than with a removable set of dentures.
Implant-supported dentures are usually supported by several implants, again made in titanium, retained in the jawbone of the patient's mouth, and a porcelain or zirconia denture is screwed on in place over those implants. A variety of options is available today as far as how many implants a patient needs to support their dentures. Sometimes it's as little as two, oftentimes up to six implants, to support a prosthetic that does not need to come out of the patient's mouth. Thereby, they're able to eat, drink, function, and speak at a much more superior level compared to removable dentures. Additionally, implant-supported dentures don't move around when patients are eating, speaking, and going about their day-to-day daily activities.
Via the newest state-of-the-art technologies, called guided dental implant surgery, we're able to utilize a very minimally invasive surgical approach, whereby we do not need to expose and cut open the gum tissues to place implants in a patient's mouth. Once the implants have integrated in that short duration of anywhere from three to six months, a patient is ready to have dentures fabricated and screwed onto the implants, whereby they don't have to remove them. Hence, when they're eating, and speaking, they don't have the worry and constant fear of dentures coming loose, falling out. That level of confidence is far superior to the possible embarrassments that could occur with the older fashioned, non-implant supported, traditional dentures.
