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Missing Teeth
Tooth loss typically occurs due to tooth decay or injury, and is a serious dental health concern that can put you at risk of developing additional costly problems. Though missing teeth can be replaced with restorative dentistry options like dentures, dental implants, and bridges, many people avoid treatment. According to the American College of Prosthodontists, about 120 million U.S. citizens are missing at least one tooth. If you’re uninsured, the price of replacing your teeth may be enough to discourage you from this idea entirely, particularly if you’re missing a molar that’s not visible when you smile. However, avoiding restoring missing teeth can be detrimental to your dental health.
Keep on reading to discover the five dental risks linked to not replacing your missing teeth.
Though your teeth are securely anchored into your jawbone, they can still shift and move over time due to receding gums or tooth decay. Avoiding replacing missing teeth can worsen this problem, as gaps in your smile create spaces into which the neighboring teeth can shift. This allows other teeth to shift, creating a chain reaction that can affect your entire mouth.
If you avoid replacing your missing teeth, you’re putting yourself at risk of losing density and volume in your jawbone. Teeth are essential to support and stimulate the bone of your jaw. Quite the same way as exercise is necessary to maintain muscles. Due to a lost tooth, the underlying jawbone will start to atrophy. Installing dental implants to replace your missing teeth is a great solution to this problem. Screws are components of dental implants that fuse with your jawbone and provide the required support, and a dental crown attached to an implant helps stimulate the growth of your jawbone.
The way your teeth on the upper and lower jaws meet each other when you bite determines your occlusion. Missing one or a couple of your teeth can result in misalignment that will affect your remaining teeth, gumline, jaw muscles and joints, neck, and head. Malocclusion of the teeth can result in numerous problems, including strained jaw muscles, sensitive teeth, TMJ disorders, tooth loss, tension headaches, and enamel erosion. Dental braces can help fix your improper bite, but it can be a very costly and extensive treatment process. It’s best to prevent this problem by replacing your teeth with dental implants instead.
We use our teeth to tear and gnash the food we consume. If you’re missing some of your premolars that are used for chewing, you may end up experiencing difficulty enjoying some of your favorite daily foods. If your front teeth are missing, it can result in a complete inability to eat hard and crunchy foods like apples, crackers, carrots, grapes, popcorn, and cereal. Your molars play a large role in grinding up meat and other types of food. Hence, missing some of those can affect the way you chew everything. Chewing problems can negatively affect your digestion, leading to problems like acid reflux.
The structure and shape of your face are partially supported by your teeth. By causing your jawbone to deteriorate, missing teeth can cause your face to fall inward. This can result in your facial expression becoming sad and aged. If you’ve ever seen people that wear removable dentures when they take them out, you can imagine how your face will look if you avoid replacing your missing teeth.
If you’re missing one or a few teeth, consider replacing them with dental implants. This restorative dentistry option provides proper support and stimulation for your jawbone, helping prevent problems like bone deterioration and associated impaired facial aesthetics. Dental implants can also help prevent your teeth from shifting, becoming crooked, and affecting the alignment of your bite.
