Your missing teeth can affect your daily life in many ways. For better or worse, those effects can be amplified during the holidays. When you are spending a lot of time around family and friends (whether that is in person or virtually), you don’t want to feel self-conscious about the appearance of your smile or how you speak.

You also don’t want to miss out on all the great food we make at this time of year.

At Drew Family Dentistry, we want you to have a complete, healthy, and functional smile. To give that back to you, your first step is calling 541-668-8070 to schedule a consultation at our Bend, OR office. We have multiple services that can give you back what you have lost.

What Can Happen

If you are missing even a single tooth, that can lead to significant problems for years to come. The impact on your oral health is similar regardless of whether your missing tooth fell out due to gum disease, knocked out as a result of an accident, or had teeth removed due to severe infections.

The gap in your smile is matched by a vacancy in your jawbone. Your roots provide stimulation that encourages new bone growth. This is essential to maintain your jaw health because old tissue is constantly being resorbed by your body.

Without a root or a dental implant to replace it, your jawbone does not get stimulated. It won’t make new bone tissue although it will continue to lose old tissue. Over time your jaw will get smaller, which increases the likelihood of losing more teeth.

Above the gumline, your remaining teeth may begin to drift. This is due to the normal pressure caused by biting and chewing. Over time, this changes both your smile and your bite, which can affect your confidence as well as your ability to eat certain foods.

The good news is that you can take steps to avoid the problems mentioned above.

Find The Right Services

The right teeth replacements for you will depend on the specifics of your situation. Here are services that may help:

  • Dental Implants – Implants fill the space in your jaw where you used to have roots. As such, implants create a connection from your restorations to your jawbone and anchor those restorations in place.
  • Dental Crowns – If you are missing a single tooth, you can place a crown on an implant for a complete restoration from top to bottom.
  • Dental Bridges – If you are missing multiple teeth, a few implants provide support to fill more than just the gap in your smile.
  • Dentures – By getting implant-supported dentures, you can look and feel like you have a full set of natural, healthy teeth.

With any of these teeth replacements, you also rebuild your biting power. This allows you to eat a variety of foods, which is good both for your oral and overall health and for your enjoyment of meals. When you can eat anything you would like, meals become one of life’s pleasures again.

Let’s Get To Work

We are confident that we can help you rebuild your smile. We can only do this, however, if you visit us. Call 541-668-8070 or fill out our online form to request your appointment at Drew Family Dentistry in Bend, OR. By working together, your smile can look as good as new.