Ridge Preservation

What is Ridge Preservation?
Ridge preservation is the process of maintaining the natural height of your oral bone called the ALVEOLAR RIDGE. This is the bone that surrounds and supports your natural teeth or your THIRD SET OF TEETH IMPLANTS. When a defect in the bone is created by a tooth extraction or periodontal disease, it is important to replace that lost bone with a material that will become bone again. Healthy bone is necessary for healthy teeth. If the bone is not preserved, your teeth may shift, the bone may resorb and you may need a second procedure to replace the lost bone. This has become a useful tool in preparing old extraction sites (years old) to obtain better quality and quantity of ridge for fixed bridge work. It has been used for a long time by Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons to better prepare the ridge for longer and wider implants and to gain height in areas such as the Maxillary sinus, thus enabling the patient to receive fixed bridge work based upon good implant design and support. We are indeed fortunate today to have "grafting" materials that come from synthetic sources. Thus the patient does not necessarily have to have their own bone removed from an additional site and transferred to the grafted (augmented) area. In our office, a great deal of attention is paid to the quality and quantity of bone and, if necessary, special diagnostic x-rays are obtained (CT scans which can be reformatted into 3-D actual images) to aid in these determinations. Usually, it is quite simple to determine and inform you if qualify for this relatively simple procedure and thus, begin the restoration of your dentition. To learn more about RIDGE PRESERVATION, please consult with our office.

Who needs help?
Patients who are wearing full dentures should have the ridges checked on a regular basis. If the denture is not secure and there are foods that are difficult to chew, the the ridge augmentation, along with implant supported over-dentures, may be of great value. The use of Over-Dentures and helped and helped many, many of our patients. As the name implies, an over-denture is a denture that is anchored by 2 or more implants. The patient is once again secured with his dentures and eating, nutrition, cosmetics, and self-worth are greatly enhanced. This is one of the most gratifying areas of my practice, escpecially since it makes our office an integral part of the restorative team.

"If you do not know when you are going, you end up somewhere else."
-Yogi Berra

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