I had four dental implants placed less than a week ago and I have already had two of them fail. I’m so frustrated. I’m guessing at this rate there is not much hope for the other two, right? Is there a way to fix this or am I going to be stuck with dentures?
Morgan
Dear Morgan,
I am glad you wrote. This is truly a dental implant disaster. Your dentist has a 50% failure rate in under a week. Most dental implant cases are a 5% failure rate and that is over their lifetime, not in a week. The first thing I want you to do is get a copy of all your diagnostics and see another dentist for a second opinion on these. One thing I want him or her to look at is whether or not you had adequate bone structure before your implants were placed. If you did not, then your dentist placed your implants knowing they would fail.
Then, I want you to ask for a complete refund. Additionally, if you had enough bone to begin with, you will also want him to cover the cost of bone grafting that will be necessary due to the dental implant failure. The dentist who gives you your second opinion can give you some idea of what that cost will be.
Make sure whomever you go to next, has post-doctoral implant training as well as experience placing them. Do not hesitate to ask them what their success rate is as well as how many they place in a year.
You didn’t mention if these were individual implants and crowns or if you were getting an implant overdenture. If they are individual implants, you will want to consider the color of your teeth. While the dental crowns that bond to your implants can be made to match any color, the color they are made to is permanent. If you are considering having teeth whitening done, the time to do it is before you have those implant crowns designed. This way they can be made to match your updated color.
This blog is brought to you by Baton Rouge Dentist Dr. Steven Collins.