Implants
A dental implant is three separate objects, and almost every problem is with one of them
The fixture goes in the bone, the abutment comes through the gum, the crown sits on top. Quotes are given for "an implant" as though it were one thing, which is how the difference between a good one and a cheap one disappears.
Treatments
Implants
A titanium fixture in the jaw, an abutment on top of it, and a crown on top of that. Everything below covers one of those three, or the bone that has to be there first.
Implants
A dental implant is three separate objects, and almost every problem is with one of them
The fixture goes in the bone, the abutment comes through the gum, the crown sits on top. Quotes are given for "an implant" as though it were one thing, which is how the difference between a good one and a cheap one disappears.
Implants
The six stages of an implant, and the months that sit between them
Two surgeries, a wait, and two fittings. The wait is the part that decides how many trips to Korea this takes, and it is the part quotes tend not to mention.
Implants
Four implant systems, and what the word on the surface actually refers to
SLA, BA, VUV, SOI. These are surface treatments, not quality grades, and the difference between them is a claim about how fast bone attaches, which is checkable.
Implants
The abutment: the part that decides whether your gum stays quiet
Stock abutments come in standard sizes. Custom ones are milled to your mouth. The difference shows up at the gum line, in food trapping, and in inflammation years later.
Implants
Bone graft in four grades, and why the grade is the number that matters
GBR runs from a spoonful of material around a fixture to a vertical rebuild held open by titanium mesh. The clinic grades it A to D, and the grade sets the difficulty, the volume, the healing time and the price.
Implants
Membrane and titanium mesh: the two things that hold a graft still
Graft material is loose particles. Something has to keep it where it was put and keep gum tissue from growing into the space first. That something is a membrane, or in the hardest cases a titanium mesh.
Implants
Sinus lift: what happens when there is an air cavity where your bone should be
In the upper back jaw the maxillary sinus sits directly above the roots, and when it drops there is no height to place into. Two approaches exist, one considerably harder than the other.
Implants
Guided implant surgery: a printed template, and a much smaller cut
The operation is simulated on a 3D scan first and a guide is printed to hold the drill on the planned path. The claim is a minimal incision instead of a laid-open flap, and the photographs make the difference obvious.
Implants
Short and mini implants: for the cases a standard fixture will not fit
One is shorter than standard, for where the nerve canal is close. The other is narrower, for where the ridge is thin. Both exist to avoid a bigger operation, and both have real trade-offs.
Implants
Front-tooth implants, and the tooth you wear in the months between
An implant at the front has to match a neighbour that is right beside it, in colour, in shape and in where the gum sits. It is the hardest aesthetic problem in dentistry and it takes months, during which you are not toothless.
Implants
Implant bridges: three teeth on two fixtures, and when that is the right answer
You do not need one fixture per missing tooth. Two can carry three, with a suspended tooth between them. It costs less and it loads the two harder.
Implants
Overdenture: a denture that is held down by implants
Two to four fixtures, an attachment on each, and a denture that clips onto them. It still comes out at night, and it stops moving when you eat.
Crowns, bridges and dentures
What replaces a missing tooth when an implant is not the answer, and what you wear in the months while an implant is healing.
Crowns, bridges and dentures
Bridges without implants, and the price the neighbouring teeth pay
A bridge fills a gap by grinding down the healthy teeth on either side and cementing a three-unit span onto them. It is quick, it is proven, and it costs you two teeth you still had.
Crowns, bridges and dentures
Temporary teeth: what you actually wear while an implant heals
A flipper is a light plate with a tooth on it, held by a wire or resin clasp. A flexible denture bends. Neither is for chewing, and both are the difference between waiting comfortably and hiding.
Cosmetic dentistry
Work done on the front teeth for the way they look. Reversible in almost no case, which is why these pages spend as long on the limits as on the method.
Gums, nerves and roots
The treatments that decide whether the tooth you have can be kept. Nearly every implant on this site exists because one of these was left too late.
Gums, nerves and roots
Gum disease: the reason most of the implants on this site exist
Bacteria inflame the tissue holding the tooth, the inflammation eats bone, and the tooth is eventually lost. Almost every implant page here describes fixing damage this caused.
Gums, nerves and roots
Root canal treatment, and the core that has to go in afterwards
The nerve is removed, the canal is cleaned and sealed, and then the hollow tooth has to be rebuilt with something hard enough to be crowned. The second half is the part patients are not told about.
This article is information, not medical advice, and reading it does not create a doctor-patient relationship. The Seoul Glow is a registered facilitator: we coordinate care, we do not practise medicine and we do not decide what treatment is right for you. No outcome can be guaranteed by anyone. Discuss any procedure with a licensed physician who has examined you.