Implant Solutions: Changing Our Patients’ Lives

It was a normal Monday and I was ready to see my first patient for a consultation. My dental assistant came and told me her story.

My patient was in pain and had been going through a lot of dental work to try to alleviate her symptoms, when I walked into the room I immediately spoke with the patient and she told me her story. She told me how she had gastric bypass surgery and one of her outcomes was having a more acidic mouth and reflux more than she ever had. I could see the pain in her eyes and I really wanted to help her, after reviewing her X-rays and looking in her mouth performing a very thorough clinical exam, it was determined that most of these teeth should be taken out at this stage. Unfortunately, when a patient has a lot of acid in their mouth, it tends to rot away their teeth.

I told her the news, and although she was sad, she knew that this was the correct thing. We talked about many options, and what we agreed upon was dentures supported by implants that would be protected from the acidic environment and hopefully last a very long time so we made the appointment to continue forward. We started with some imaging and diagnostic scans to prepare for her surgical procedure. Once her surgical guide came back, we had her appointment for the extractions and implants and had temporary denture for her.

She reported she had only two or three days of soreness, and otherwise healed very well. For the upper arch or maxilla, it took about six months for her to heal and for her lower arch or the mandible, it took about three months to heal. After both were healed, we continued forward with the restoration process during her healing.

Although she wasn’t done with her treatment, she let me know – this was one of the best decisions she’s ever made in her life and she was finally out of pain! It is such a joy to take a patient from pain to not being in pain anymore. We continued forward with treatment, and we expose the implants to make proper impressions for her finals, after her impressions were approved we continued forward with the trial phase – a smile that she would wear temporarily and that could be adjusted very easily. She wore the trial smile for about one to two months. We checked on the trial several times, and we finally got it. Perfect! We sent back the trial smile, and it was to be made into her permanent smile two weeks in the lab.

We delivered her final smile, and we got to see her smile very, very big again! This is such a happy case for myself and the patient where we can both leave smiling. Dental implants are an amazing solution for many patients, and can serve us and many ways!