What are dentures?

Dentures are a set of removable artificial teeth which replaces the missing teeth. They can be upper jaw denture & lower jaw denture.

 

HOW MANY TYPES OF DENTURES ARE THERE?

  • Partial dentures: Having one or more teeth.
  • Complete dentures: replacing entire set of teeth.

They can also be classified in to

  • Tissue supported dentures
  • Implant supported dentures

Depending on the material used they may be classified as

  • All acrylic dentures.
  • Cast partial dentures (with metal base)
  • Flexible dentures.

WHAT ARE THE ADVANTAGES OF DENTURE?

    Dentures can help patients in a number of ways:

  • Mastication – chewing efficiency of the patient is improved.
  • Aesthetics – presence of teeth provide a natural facial appearance, and wearing a denture to replace missing teeth provides support for the lips and cheeks and corrects the collapsed appearance that occurs after losing teeth.
  • Phonetics – by replacing missing teeth, especially the front teeth, patients are better able to speak by improving pronunciation of many words.
  • Self-Esteem – Patients feel better about themselves & their self confidence improves a lot.

WHAT ARE IMPLANT SUPPORTED DENTURES?

Maxillary denture is usually relatively straightforward & has a whole palate for support so that it is stable without slippage. A lower full denture on the other hand has constantly moving tongue which destabilize it so it should or must be supported by 2-4 implants placed in the lower jaw for support. A lower denture supported by 2-4 implants is a far superior product than a lower denture without implants.