Dental bone grafting is used when there’s not enough of your jawbone left to hold a denture or dental implant. Once you lose a tooth, the bone around that tone begins to recede back into the body. The only way you can prevent this is to immediately get an implant or preservation graft.
Types of Dental Bone Graft
There are three different types of bone grafts at Harmony Dental Care in Oshawa, ON.
- Socket grafts or preservation grafts are the first steps in putting in a dental implant.
- Block bone grafts will use your own bone when there’s too much bone loss to consider using a cow bone.
- Sinus lift procedures will require an oral or maxillofacial surgeon to create a pocket that’s above the teeth in the upper jaw that doesn’t affect your sinuses. This is needed to do a bone graft.
Where does the grafting bone come from?
There are four different types of grafting bone that can be used at Harmony Dental Care.
- There are human cadaver bones that have been sterilized and freeze-dried.
- There are cow bones that are sterilized and processed to minimize infection chances.
- You can use your own bone, but this usually takes several surgeries and costs more.
- You can use synthetic bones, which are made from artificial materials. It’s as safe using your own bone.
Will you need a Bone Graft?
The decision to get a bone graft is going to be dependent on what caused you to lose your teeth in the first place. There are several things that can cause tooth loss including trauma and periodontal disease. How long have you been missing your teeth? Has it been months or years? The longer the tooth is gone from your jawbone, the more the bone has probably shrunken down and atrophied.
If you want to find out more about dental bone grafting, you should talk to your dental implant Oshawa dentist at Harmony Dental Care. They can provide you with more information and get you started with bone grafting so that you can then get implants or other alternative restorations like dentures.
