Your dental health is an important part of your overall physical and mental health. Dental issues such as missing teeth can cause you to smile less and lead to other issues with your self-esteem. In addition, missing teeth can create complications and negatively impact your health and well-being. When you have a missing tooth or teeth, Dr. Shields can help correct this through the use of dental implants.

Causes

Several factors can lead to tooth loss. These can include aging, physical injury, serious gum infections, tooth decay, and smoking. Other less obvious causes of tooth loss include high blood pressure, diabetes, and rheumatoid arthritis. No matter the cause, missing teeth is a problem you should discuss with your dentist as soon as possible.

Oral Complications

Missing teeth can lead to an assortment of dental health complications and some of the most common ones can include the following.

1. Speech Difficulties: when you are missing teeth it can affect your ability to speak and can interfere with the pronunciation of certain words. When molars and premolars are missing the overall effect is minimal if it occurs at all. However, missing front teeth can have a more notable impact. Missing front teeth can make certain words harder to say. The location of the tooth can play a factor. In general, the more toward your four upper incisors the missing tooth is, the more noticeable the effect on your speech can be.
2. Trouble Eating: Another reason to get dental implants if you are missing teeth is that they can make eating more difficult. Every type of tooth serves an important role when eating. Incisors cut food, canines tear food, premolars typically crush food and your molars are used to grind food. If one or several of your teeth are messing you lose the ability to do one of these tasks as you chew. For example, if your incisors are missing you won’t be able to easily tear food. A lack of molars reduces the ability to grind foods which can limit your diet to softer foods. Depending on the type or number of teeth, missing the impact on your daily meals can be quite frustrating.
3. Shifting Teeth: when you have missing teeth this can impact your other remaining teeth. The space caused by a missing tooth can cause your other teeth to start to shift. This can lead to your teeth spreading apart or squeezing together. Both can lead to pain when trying to bite or chew and can make regular dental care such as flossing harder. Shifted teeth can also be more susceptible to dental health problems such as bacteria collection and further tooth decay.
4. Jaw Density: your teeth and jawbone share a mutually beneficial relationship. Your jawbone supports your teeth and in turn, your teeth keep your jawbone healthy. When you have missing teeth this can damage your jawbone due to atrophy. While one missing tooth will likely not result in notable physical changes several missing teeth can lead to health concerns such as a change in face shape (referred to as facial collapse) and a negative impact on your sinuses. A cosmetic dentist can help prevent these issues through the use of dental implants.

Contact Us

Missing teeth are a dental health concern you should have checked by a professional to avoid complications. The issues missing teeth can cause with your overall health and even common daily activity such as eating make them a problem you should not ignore. Dr. Tiffany Shields Jacksonville Florida can help you with your missing teeth and solutions such as dental implants offer a superior method of replacing your missing teeth.