Tuesday 18 August 2015

Dental Implants: The Benefits of Guided Implant Surgery

For dentists who provide implant dentistry without the aid of 3D technology, implant placement can be educated guesswork. Determining the right angle and location of placement for implants often means that only patients in superior oral health can receive implant care, without being referred out to a specialist’s office. At Leon Springs Family Dental, we use 3D imaging for what is called guided dental implant surgery.

The Elimination of Guesswork

With advanced imaging, our implant dentists do not have to guess at the right spots for placing your implants. The 3D technology used for planning your treatment helps our dentists pinpoint the areas where bone in your jaw is the most dense, allowing for successful placement of your implant post. With the combination of both CEREC in-house milling and 3D imaging, we can also fabricate a small template that is placed at the site of implantation and guides the direction of placement.

Implant Placement for Patients with Bone Quality Issues

The placement of implant posts requires patients to have healthy bone volume. This allows the implants to properly integrate with tissue, so patients can receive sturdy new teeth. Patients with low bone quality, due to prolonged lack of natural teeth, can sometimes be disqualified from either in-house placement of implants by a general dentist, or may require pre-treatment with a bone graft before implants are installed. However, guided implants surgery allows us to visualize areas where bone is dense and could support an implant. This opens the door for a greater number of patients with varying bone qualities to receive implants in our office.  Without this guided surgery, many dentists are unable to provide implant placement and may refer patients to an oral surgeon for additional care.

Stronger, Longer-Lasting Restorations

Guided implant surgery with the aid of 3D imaging and CEREC technology helps us give patients the best long-term dental implant results. We design the angle and select the appropriate placement site to support maximum strength during the osseointegration process, thereby reducing the likelihood that your implant may not properly integrate and become loose.  Our dentists are able to target healthy areas of bone to determine the best course of action for your implant dentistry treatment plan.

If you have questions about dental implants, contact our San Antonio dentists for more information about guided implant surgery.

Tuesday 4 August 2015

The Benefits of CEREC Same-Day Crowns

The clearest benefit of getting a one-visit dental crown with CEREC technology is that your smile can be restored in just one dental appointment. But CEREC restorations provide patients with many other benefits for comfortable and convenient treatment that include:

No Messy Impressions

Getting a traditional dental crown made at a lab means taking impressions of your smile with bulky trays and goopy impression paste. This process can trigger a gag reflex in some and is overall a less-than-pleasant experience. Because CEREC uses 3D imaging to provide a reproduction of your smile, there is no need to use standard impressions.

Accurate Treatment Planning

Impression trays often don’t produce precise pictures of the shape of teeth. This leaves dental lab technicians to do the best they can with limited information, which can be hit-and-miss according to the lab and the person creating the crown. With the digital model of your teeth that CEREC produces, the digital version of new crown can be created to be a precise fit for your existing teeth.

Stronger, Natural-Looking Restorations

Crowns made from pure porcelain are not only beautiful, but they prove to be extraordinarily strong. CEREC produces dental crowns that return long-lasting strength and health to smiles in need of treatment for dental decay. Pure porcelain dental crowns provide for more natural results over time, as opposed to porcelain-over-metal crowns.

No Need for Temporaries

Because CEREC crowns can be created – from treatment planning to placement – in just one dental appointment, there’s no need to put temporary restorations on teeth while crowns are being created at a dental lab over the course of two weeks. With CEREC technology, Dr. Kozelsky can completely restore a damaged tooth in as little as an hour.

If you have one or more teeth with decayed dental enamel, and are in need of a restoration, contact our San Antonio CEREC dentist for quick and custom-made dental crowns. We can give you a beautiful and strong smile in just one dental appointment.