Dental Implants

Dental implants are advanced, biocompatible structures designed to replace the missing roots of teeth. By mimicking natural tooth structures, dental implants offer you a strong and aesthetically pleasing solution to replace your missing teeth. At NYC Smile Design, our dental implant and their restorations comprise three essential parts:

Dental implants offer several significant advantages over traditional solutions like bridges or removable dentures:

1. Preservation of Surrounding Teeth: Unlike bridges, which often require the alteration of adjacent teeth to anchor the restoration, dental implants do not impact neighboring teeth. This preserves the natural structure and health of your surrounding teeth.
2. Bone Health Maintenance: Dental implants are anchored directly into the jawbone, similar to natural tooth roots. This stimulates the bone and helps prevent bone loss, maintaining jawbone integrity and preventing changes to your facial structure. In contrast, bridges and dentures do not provide this stimulation, which can lead to bone deterioration over time.
3. Stability and Comfort: Dental implants provide a fixed, stable solution that functions like natural teeth. Unlike removable dentures, which can slip or cause discomfort, implants remain securely in place, allowing for comfortable eating, speaking, and smiling without the worry of them shifting.
4. Longevity and Durability: Implants are known for their durability and longevity. With proper care, they can last a lifetime, making them a cost-effective long-term solution compared to bridges and dentures, which may need to be replaced or adjusted over time.
5. Improved Aesthetics and Function: Dental implants look and feel like natural teeth. They are custom-made to match your existing teeth, providing a seamless and natural appearance. This not only improves the aesthetics of your smile but also restores full function, allowing you to eat your favorite foods without restriction and restoring proper chewing, which helps maintain nutrition.
6. Enhanced Oral Health: Because dental implants integrate with your jawbone and do not rely on adjacent teeth for support, they promote better overall oral health. This can help keep adjacent teeth stable, preserve alignment, maintain the natural alignment of your jaw, and reduce the risk of TMJ disorders due to bite misalignment.

At NYC Smile Design, we offer dental implants to help you achieve a beautiful, functional, and healthy smile. By choosing implants, you can enjoy these numerous benefits and experience a significant improvement in your quality of life.

Step 1: Planning

To ensure the best possible outcome, we begin with advanced digital scanning and imaging. This technology allows us to assess the bone quality in the area where you are missing teeth. Using this detailed information, we create a precise plan for your implant placement, optimizing both functionality and aesthetics.

Step 2: Implant Placement

Using the digitally designed plan, our team of specialists will place your implants with precision. This careful approach ensures that the implants are positioned perfectly to support the final restoration, providing you with a strong and beautiful smile.

Step 3: Healing

After the implants are placed, a healing period is necessary for the implants to osseointegrate with the bone. During this time, new bone grows and interlocks around the dental implants, securing them firmly in place. This natural biological fixation process typically takes between 90 to 180 days.

Step 4: Temporary Restoration

While your implants are healing, we provide temporary restorations to maintain the appearance of your smile, especially in visible areas. Depending on your specific situation, this temporary solution could be a removable retainer-like device or a temporary tooth that is securely glued in place.

Step 5: Abutment and Crown Placement

Once your implants have fully integrated with the bone, we move on to the final stage. Custom-made abutments are placed into the implants. These abutments serve as connectors between the implants and the crowns. Finally, the crowns, which are designed to match your natural teeth, are attached to the abutments, completing your smile and restoring full function and appearance.

Throughout this process, our focus is on your comfort and satisfaction. We use the latest techniques and technology to ensure that each step is as smooth and painless as possible, leading to a successful and beautiful outcome.

Dental implants are a versatile solution suitable for most adults, regardless of age, who have missing teeth and sufficient bone support. Age itself is not a limiting factor; rather, the main considerations are overall health and bone quality. 

For older adults, certain health concerns may need to be addressed before proceeding with dental implants. However, with proper assessment and care, many older patients successfully receive implants and enjoy their benefits.

We typically recommend waiting until the facial and dental bones have fully matured before placing implants, making early teens the only common exception. This ensures the best long-term results.

Implants can be placed immediately after a tooth extraction or even years later. As long as there is enough healthy bone to support the implant, timing is flexible. If there has been significant bone loss over time, additional procedures such as bone grafting may be necessary to create a stable foundation for the implant.

At NYC Smile Design, we are committed to evaluating each patient’s unique situation to provide the best possible care and outcomes.

Dental implants are designed to last a lifetime with proper care, making them the most durable tooth replacement option available. Unlike other alternatives, implants can provide a permanent solution for missing teeth.

After the implant procedure, we recommend starting with a soft diet to allow the implant to heal properly. Soon after, however, you can return to enjoying all your favorite foods without any restrictions.

Maintaining your dental implants is simple. Regular brushing and flossing, along with routine dental check-ups, are all that’s needed to keep your implants in excellent condition. With these easy steps, you can ensure your implants remain strong and functional for years to come.

At NYC Smile Design, we focus on providing you with a long-lasting, natural-looking smile through the use of dental implants, ensuring both functionality and aesthetics are preserved.