Dental Treatment Plans – A Road Map to a Better Smile
Since everyone's smile is different, no single treatment is going to work perfectly for all dental patients. Your dentist should employ a variety of techniques, products, and procedures in order to create a customized dental treatment plan for you. Whether you are having a general dentistry procedure or a cosmetic dentistry procedure, you should be informed about what your dentists can provide you.
When you are deciding on what dental procedure you want to have performed, many questions and options must be taken into consideration. For many people, it helps to talk with their dentist about what results they want to see from the procedure. "I work one on one with my patients to determine what their goals are and how I can help them achieve those goals," says Dr. Pavlenko, cosmetic dentist in Edmonton, Alberta.
If you are suffering from a dental problem, there is usually more than one way to correct it. For instance, if you have a missing tooth, there are various ways to correct it, such as a dental bridge or a dental implant. A good dentist will provide you with all of the available options and help you choose which one will give you the results you want.
Many times, a contributing factor in the dental work someone chooses is the cost. Some dentists will aid you in selecting a treatment that is perfect, but then stop helping when the bill arrives. Cosmetic dentists like Dr. Pavlenko provide affordable financing options for your dentistry needs. This way, money doesn't stand in the way of you achieving your dental goals.
Dental procedures do not have to be decided by the dentist alone and the procedure should not be a mystery to you. By employing the most advanced techniques and devices, like digital x-rays, intraoral cameras, and neuromuscular dentistry, Dr. Pavlenko can explain to you exactly what your treatment will be and what it will do.
By knowing exactly what procedures and what results your dentist can provide, you will be better informed to make the important dental decisions that concern you and your mouth.
An Introduction To Dental Implants – Part 2 Of 2
The Procedure
A dental implant procedure is not a one visit process, typically taking several visits to one or more dental experts. As with any medical procedure, the first step is to find a qualified, skillful, and trustworthy surgeon to perform your dental implant procedure. Having a capable dentist can be the deciding factor of whether or not you will be pleased with the results.
First, the dentist will take x-rays of your mouth and perform a thorough oral examination. Typically, the dentist will administer a local anesthetic to ease any discomfort during the operation. A pilot hole is then bored into the jawbone, to allow for the placement of the implant. After the hole is drilled, the implant is inserted into position. The implant is left for around four months to fuse into the jawbone through a natural process known as Osseo integration.
After a few months, and when the implant has fused securely to the bone, the dentist will then attach the post to the implant. The post is the support for the synthetic replacement or replacements.
The last part of the procedure is known as the restorative phase. This is when the dentist will take impressions and create the necessary prosthesis that will attach to the implant or implants. This process normally take several visits in itself.
Qualified Dentists
You may find that you will have to see several different dentists in order to complete your dental implant procedure. Periodontists and oral surgeons are both qualified to perform the first part of the process, placing the implant or implants. If a periodontist or oral surgeon is used to complete the implant procedure, then a restorative dentist will be required to complete the process during the later visits.
Implantologists are qualified to perform the entire procedure themselves, from beginning to end.
Long-term Success
Overall, dental implant procedures have about a 90% success rate, and many last more than 20 years. With good oral hygiene, your dental implants can last you a lifetime. The success of your procedure also depends on the quality and quantity of bone available to the dental surgeon. The better the bone, and the more of it, the better the chances of a complete success.
The quality of the restorative prosthesis placed on top of the implant is also a major factor affecting the success of your procedure. If the design of the crown, over-dentures, or other prostheses are poorly constructed or poorly designed, the biting forces of the mouth will not be balanced and may cause complications in the future.
Who Does NOT Qualify for Dental Implants?
Some medical conditions or specific physical characteristics may make it impossible or dangerous to have a dental implant procedure performed. People who suffer from uncontrolled diabetes, parathyroid disorders, blood disorders, rare bone disorders, or bone marrow cancer should not consider getting dental implants. Also, those undergoing or who recently have undergone chemotherapy or other radiation therapy should avoid this procedure.
Some with certain physical characteristics such as insufficient or poor quality bone, low sinuses, or low nerve bundles may also not qualify for dental implant procedures.
Cure Cavities, Ancient Cavity Cure Rediscovered
It is not true that conventional dental treatments and fluoride are the only ways to heal your teeth from cavities. When struck with the diagnoses of a dental cavity, most people feel totally helpless or powerless to do anything about it themselves. The common belief about tooth decay is that once you have a cavity, the tooth cavity cannot heal or reverse. The only solution seems to be to rush off to the dentist and have a synthetic material placed in your teeth to cover the breached tooth structure.
People go to dentists for regular check-ups, or because they have toothache pain or gum swelling. The dentist takes x-rays and then, many times, informs you of the dreadful news - you have a cavity. But you need not worry. For a few hundred dollars, the newest filling material can be placed in your mouth and the problem is solved.
Or is it?
Know as the world's greatest dentist, Weston A. Price, although you probably haven't heard of him, he made a detailed accounting of how to cure cavities, and how to prevent those toothaches forever. Dr. Price wrote dental manuals that were carried on board of Navy ships, and was head of research at the forerunner to the American Dental Society.
What is Dental Surgery?
A dentist is a D.D.S., which means a Doctor of Dental Surgery. The way a dentist cures a cavity is with a minor surgery on your tooth. The methodology involves drilling a bigger hole in your mouth and then filling the hole with a synthetic material. As a result of a dental surgery, the pain may temporary cease, but the cause never gets addressed. Let me explain: In an extensive study of over 15,000 people, the Centers for Disease Control published some statistics regarding tooth decay that should be cause for alarm for most people. On average, people ages 16-19 have 11.6% of all teeth affected by decay at one time. This steadily increases, and by the time adults are over age 60, more than half of their teeth (62.36%) have been affected by decay and a total of 93.1% of all people over the age of 60 have had teeth affected by tooth decay. If brushing, flossing, massive fluoridation campaigns, and dental surgery were effective in preventing tooth decay and toothache pain after visiting the dentist the problem would never return.
The Current Cavity Theory is Wrong
The current theory of tooth decay according to the American Dental Association:
"[Tooth decay] occurs when foods containing carbohydrates (sugars and starches) such as milk, pop, raisins, cakes or candy are frequently left on the teeth. Bacteria that live in the mouth thrive on these foods, producing acids as a result. Over a period of time, these acids destroy tooth enamel, resulting in tooth decay."
There are several problems with this theory.
#1) No matter how much you brush, it is impossible to keep your mouth free of bacteria - supposedly we breathe in over 14,000 germs per hour.
#2) Some groups of Indigenous people who had fermentable carbohydrates (bread or grains) stuck on their teeth all of the time, without any brushing or flossing, were mostly or entirely free of tooth decay.
#3) Bacteria do not eat processed sugars because of the lack of nutrients found in them. In fact, sugars are processed not only to prevent spoilage, but also to prevent consumption by bacteria. It does not make sense that these nutrient-void sugars which destroy bacteria in the normal world, somehow miraculously become food for bacteria once in your mouth.
#4) Bacteria does not eat processed flour for the same reason. Processed flours are designed to prevent spoilage, and thus the minerals (bacteria food) are removed.
#5) Foods that bacteria like to eat include milk, vegetables, meat, fish, and fruit; these are not commonly attributed with being the causes of tooth decay.
#6) The large CDC survey described above shows that despite all of our prevention efforts, on average about 90% of our population has had tooth decay at least one time. This means that even in the best case, our preventative methods only work for 10% of the people.
What Really Causes Tooth Decay
After reading and studying the work of Weston Price, late Harvard Professor Earnest Hooten said we need to consider the habits and ways of the Indigenous people, because "It is store food that has given us store teeth." Time and time again, Dr. Price documented the tragic plight of Indigenous people coming into contact with modern industrialization. Many of these groups enjoyed generation after generation of life without significant tooth decay. But after the arrival of industry and commerce, and with them modern foods, their teeth began to degenerate very rapidly Published data from food surveys done by the United States Department of Agriculture show that a significant portion of the population is under nourished.
It should not be surprising why. We eat junk food, processed food, denatured food, and chemically-laden foods. These foods lack the special fat-soluble vitamins which Indigenous people would, at times, go great lengths to obtain. That means if you want to be healthy, you need to take time and effort to pay attention to what you eat. You cannot just go to the local convenience store and expect that a packaged food product is designed to give you optimal health. It is important to reflect upon the long term consequences of each and every bite of processed and denatured food you eat. The most deadly forms of processed and denatured foods are processed sugar and processed flour. Those are found in breakfast cereals, packaged foods, pastries and breads, soda, and sweetened drinks. By removing these foods from your diet, your immunity to cavities will increase. But that's not the whole story, read about five tooth mineralizing protocols that use whole foods in "Cure Tooth Decay: Heal and Prevent Cavities With Nutrition" by Ramiel Nagel.


