The only good time to lose a tooth is when you’re young and your adult teeth are coming in, right? That may seem like the correct answer, but you might be surprised to learn that there are other instances when it is good to lose your teeth. Tooth extraction may sound scary, but it is more often beneficial for your overall oral health than not. Let’s take a look at some of the reasons for losing teeth.
Wisdom Teeth
One of the most common times dentists extract teeth is when your wisdom teeth start to grow in. Wisdom teeth are the third molars in your mouth, and the last set of teeth to arrive. Because the rest of your adult teeth have erupted a long time ago, they are probably sitting comfortable where they are. Wisdom teeth often disrupt that comfort and make a mess of things. These molars can grow in wrong and cause the rest of your teeth to go crooked. In the best case scenario, your dentist will remove your wisdom teeth before they can do any serious damage.
Orthodontic Treatments
If you need to get braces, it means your teeth are already doing something funky. Orthodontic work can fix all of that, but if there are teeth that won’t serve a purpose or teeth that just won’t fit with the braces, they will need to be extracted. While this may seem unnecessary, extracting a tooth for braces can make room for all of the alignment changes that will happen with braces.
Severe Trauma
Restorative dental procedures have come a long way in recent years, but there are still cases where restorative treatment like crowns or fillings won’t work on your teeth. This is the case with severely damaged teeth. After the trauma, your dentist will take a look at the affected teeth and first see if they can be saved. If they can’t he or she will recommend extraction. Remember that this is for the good of your oral health. When a tooth becomes too damaged, it can cause more problems than not.
Decay and Disease
A lack of dental care can cause serious issues in your mouth. If you aren’t properly taking care of your tooth, they can easily decay or disease can strike. Disease and decay can completely destroy a tooth if left alone long enough. In cases like these, extraction is often the only resolution.
Life After Extraction
So, what happens to your mouth after you’ve had teeth extracted? Don’t worry too much. Your dentist won’t let you live with a huge gap in your smile. In fact, this is actually very unhealthy. Gaps that teeth should occupy cause other teeth to cave in on themselves and the overall strength of your jaw bone can lessen.
After getting a tooth extracted, your dentist will often recommend a dental implant to replace that tooth. This is a relatively simple procedure where the dentist inserts a titanium rod into your jaw bone. Your dentist then affixes a fake tooth on top of that rod. This helps your mouth continue to stay healthy while you have full chewing and speaking capabilities.