Discover Our Approach to Dental Crowns and Bridges
As far as crowns are concerned, we do replacement crowns. Meaning that if a patient has already had a crown done, and there’s a problem with the crown, or the crown is broken, or there’s decay underneath the tooth, we would replace that crown with a new crown. And the crowns we use are metal-free crowns. We use crowns which are made of either zirconia or lithium disilicate, which don’t require much tooth preparation. From a first-choice perspective, if a tooth is broken, our first choice is not a crown. A crown, in my humble opinion, is too invasive. We prefer to use techniques which are less invasive, and they allow us to preserve more of the tooth.
Now, as far as bridges are concerned, once again, we do replacement bridges. A bridge would not be my first choice in restoring a missing space because we are cutting teeth down. Our first choice would be a dental implant. Now, even if we’re replacing a bridge if there’s enough bone in the middle our preference would definitely be to put an implant in the middle and do crowns on either side. So the patient can floss in between the teeth.
Now, what are the types of patients we do bridges on? We do bridge on patients who cannot undergo any surgery for any reason. Now, there are certain medical conditions which preclude the patient undergoing surgery. And in those patients, we do bridges, and we do them in a way that provides longevity.