Denture Information

Complete Dentures

Complete dental appliances are made of an acrylic base that sits on and against the gum tissue and include the synthetic dentition, which make occlusal contact when the mouth is at the closed position. They are held in place to the surface of the gum tissue, either by normal atmospheric pressure retention or like in many cases with the help and use of denture adhesives to increase retention. Due to current advancements it is possible to give almost all patients a dental appliance with a very natural appearance functioning well and aiding in chewing, speech phonetics, and also helping to keep the surrounding facial area in correct alignment. Normally, I would ask the patient to wait at least two to three months to allow for the appropriate and necessary healing time, after the extraction of the natural dentition. This will help obtain a more accurate fit of the dental appliance.

The ultimate result with full dental appliances should be as comfortable as possible. Regardless of the reason or cause resulting in an edentulous mouth, a person cannot go through life without teeth. The effect that it has on appearance can have a huge consequence on patients, psyche and self-esteem, including problematic social behaviour. However the most perturbing factor those of us practitioner concern ourselves with, is the detrimental consequence a partially and even more so a totally edentulous mouth has on a patient’s current and future health circumstance. It’s crucial to make an intelligent and educated choice finally deciding on getting new dental appliances. When the patient has received the dental appliances it is prudent to keep the mouth and dental appliance extremely clean for a healthy and hygienic mouth and body.

Immediate Dentures are predominantly chosen purely for the sake of the patient not being disadvantaged socially, in terms of lack of deficient appearance. Insert occurring straight after the removal of broken, decayed or even in some sad cases unaffected natural teeth. These particular appliances I, always consider and express to the patients as temporary appliances. Although this sort of appliance at time can make patient s feel better with their initial appearance compared to an edentulous appearance and at times help with healing, swelling and bleeding control, they can be very painful and to difficult to most. Before immediate dentures are made, an impression of the patient’s mouth including dentition is taken and cast made in order for the dentures to be constructed as best possible, ready for the insert stage.