They’re in excellent shape, health-wise, but they are ugly, due to my being some sort of mutant. In particular, my two baby upper cuspids never fell out and the adult ones showed up where two adult incisors should have been. So I have four canine fangs instead of the usual two, and so my smile is full of pointy upper teeth instead of flat ones.
So tell me about having teeth capped. I absolutely loath the dentist and go only when absolutely necessary. Fortunately I have never had a cavity or need for any oral procedure aside from standard cleanings.
Will they give me the laughing gas? Because that would probably help.
I really don’t like dentists either. But I asked a friend who used to be a dental assistant for a referral and I got the best dentist in the world! I got my caps within the last year. I don’t remember any pain. Once he worked for four hours on my teeth and it seemed like an hour and a half.
Yes, I had nitrous oxide – even when my teeth were cleaned. I had uppers and lowers capped. Make sure you get the kind of caps that won’t show a blackness if your gums start to pull away from the teeth.
My dentist goes to a lot of conventions, seminars, and continuing education programs. After this weekend, I will ask him if he knows someone personally in Brooklyn who has similar standards.
I have the worst teeth in the world, so I have lots of crowns (I don’t think dentists ever call them caps).
Two things I think are important:
Most important: A good crown should fit properly when it’s put in. A lot of dentists, maybe most of them, get crowns back from the lab that are a bit high, then they grind them down until the bite is correct. This is bad, as it compromises the crown, which may very well wear through later on. I’ve had this happen. A good dentist won’t do that. I the crown doesn’t fit, they’ll send it back and have it redone. You’re paying a mint for the things; don’t let a dentist cheap out on you.
Important, but much less so: If you’re having a molar crowned, don’t get enamel crowns. They are prone to cracking. This is not a disaster, as there’s a real crown under the enamel, but it’s a pain in the butt. Get plain old gold. Obviously, most people will go for an enamel crown for teeth that are readily visible.
Nitrous oxide is a good high, and makes the time go by quicker. It may take a while to wear off in some people, though. If you find you’re one of those, don’t drive afterwards.
I am currently going through this. You may be able to just get veneers, rather than caps. Two of my teeth are crooked enough that the doc said he thinks we better cap them, then the rest we are going to put veneers on.
As far as the process: I just had two caps put on back teeth. They were broken. The doc numbed me up. shaped the tooth, took impressions and put temps on. Then we have real caps made. He numbed me up. too the temps off, shaped the tooth some more and put the real caps on. (This happened yesterday.)
Today I’m in no pain and everything seems good to go.
I second this strongly. Ask your dentist what his policy is BEFORE, because he may refuse to send it back then you’re just stuck.
The other thing to watch for is a crown is much stronger than your own teeth. Therefore if you get a molor capped on the top of your mouth, and the molar directly below it is not capped, the non-capped tooth will wear away quicker. If the non-capped tooth has a filling this is especially true. Evenutally you will wear away the tooth below it and need to cap it. Now it may take ten years for this to happen.
This is why some dentist recommend a gold cap which wears well but is softer. Of course you can see it so a lot of people don’t like that. It might be a good option for a back molar no one can see.
Caps are great but really heed that warning above, find out before hand. 'Cause I have a reshaped cap that I hate, but the dentist said “Well I’m not sending it back. take it or leave it.” So I was stuck and of course I didn’t return to that dentist, so find out beforehand.
I’ve had 6, all molars. Getting them was not bad. It took longer than a filling or root canal or extraction, and included having impressions made (rubber molds on which to base the shape of the manufactured crown). There was also a wait of, oh, maybe 10 or 14 days with a temporary plastic crown before the finished one came back from its manufactory. The temporaries are not strong enough for normal service, and come with a warning about chewing hard crunchy things, and I had no trouble with the first few but then shattered one eating granola, which in retrospect was dumb. They replaced it that day, I think.
Several of mine were porcelain, and I broke big chunks of it off over the years, so now I’m getting gold ones. They are very nice in the sense of being a bit lubricious when I happen to meet the crown with another tooth, whereas the porcelain ones make great squeaking groaning noises when ground; sometimes other people can hear the noise too.
I don’t know why getting the crown back high would be a problem, as the dentist will make it fit. It gets thinner, yes, but the end goal is to wind up with it mating properly with the opposing teeth, and you want to retain a certain amount of your original tooth as a stub to mount it on. The cap fits the tooth stub very accurately. Therefore the cap is going to wind up as thick as the distance between the tooth stub and the opposing tooth, whether the lab makes it that way or the dentist does. In fact, I think if the lab tried to make it exactly right, the lab’s error distribution is going to have half of its error leaving the crown too low. The dentist can adjust the height gradually and approach an ideal value slowly. The lab gets only one shot, and can’t even look in your mouth. Therefore you ought to wind up with thinner and weaker caps if the dentist DOESN’T have to grind them down. But this is just my logic, not something any dentist has told me.
I definitely think caps are a good development and work well to fix bad teeth. I wouldn’t hesitate, or fret, before opting for one for the next tooth that seems to need it.
My husband is going through this now - his top front teeth are a bridge and now his bottom front need to be pulled, the bridge has worn away the bottom teeth so much there is barely any bone left.
Not true. My dentist has sent back crowns that didn’t fit properly. It just depends on the policies of the dentist and the lab. Also, while they can’t look in your mouth, this is not a disadvantage: you can’t fashion a crown inside a person’s mouth. The lab has the impression, which is quite accurate.
As far as I’m concerned, a dentist who doesn’t do the job right but charges you anyway is ethically challenged.
My dentist now has a computer that makes the crown in their office. You don’t need a temp crown which is nice. And she does make another if the first one does not fit.
I have had so many caps that I remind myself of the Terminator when I am brushing!
They look great outside, but most of my teeth were hollow.
When I had them capped, my dentist took a mold of my teeth and got the caps back perfectly sized. I apparently have very few nerve endings in my teeth and it was painless to get them fitted.
Absolutely. The dentist is billing you for a product from his supplier, and the dentist should cover any screw ups, whether caused by the supplier or by himself.
You, of course, may free to go to a dentist who doesn’t stand behind his/her work. I try to avoid throwing my money away.
Cool. I’ll bet they’ll be very common in a few years, as that’s a significant competitive advantage.
I had a few temp crowns break so for me having the real crown right off the bat is really good, and it means you only have 1 visit, not 2.
They make the crown in the office based on pictures they take of your tooth - the pictures are sent to a computer controlled milling machine. The crowns are 100% porcelain, there is no metal in them.
My dentist said that even the used one were about 30K and he didn’t do enough crowns to justify it. I looked for dentists that had that machine, but in my area the ones that do charged much more and it wasn’t worth it to me.
My dentist has a large practice with 4 dentists so they can afford the machine. The cost to me was the same as a regular crown. For a solo dentist it probably is hard to get back your investment.
One reason my dentist can also afford it is they use sedation dentistry so they often get patients who are very fearful of a dentist. And those type people can have a lot of problems that need crowns to repair.
I’ve got pretty severe dental phobia (bad experience at age 13 with a tooth that Would. Not. Get. Numbed, followed by numerous similar experiences since then) and the combination of nitrous and Halcion (a benzo-class sleeping pill) made my first big crown / filling experience go amazingly well. I had to have a root canal after that, and the endodontist was surprised that I wanted Halcion as well as the nitrous. Having had a root canal with neither of those (and those pesky teeth that didn’t want to get numb), I assured the endodontist that really, he WANTED me stoned even if he didn’t know it yet).
Since then I’ve had several fillings etc. just with nitrous (no Halcion - the advantage being that if it’s just nitrous I can just sit for a few minutes then drive myself home). It’s a panicky feeling when the stuff first starts to hit - I can’t imagine why anyone would do it recreationally - but then after 5-10 minutes I get to that “lalalalalalalalalala” zone where I don’t mind if they take a while at it.
But, regarding caps - have you consulted with anyone about orthodontia? Residual baby teeth and mis-located adult teeth sound more like an orthodontic problem than anything else! I’d at least see about that before grinding down and capping what are otherwise very healthy teeth. Alternately, at least look into the veneers first - something I should do as my teeth are badly discolored (early exposure to tetracycline, we think).
The Halcion pill I described above would qualify as sedation dentistry, I think. I remember the work being done, but I really didn’t care what was happening The downside of it, however, is you can’t drive yourself to/from the appointment, while with just nitrous, you’re fine a few minutes after they turn it off. Oh, and with the pill, I’d go home and sleep for hours afterward which could interfere with sleeping that night.
I could remain awake / vertical (mostly) if I had to though - we had to have a guinea pig funeral after one such visit, and I distinctly remember listing a bit to one side during that
Anyway - if someone’s just got some mild anxiety, or wants something to make the time pass faster, I’d consider just nitrous.
Oh, and bring an iPod or whatever and plug yourself in. That also helps.
Nobody knows for sure why but redheads have more problems with all kinds of anesthesia. It’s probably related to genetics.
I knew a guy who grew up as the son of a minister. Because of his dad they often got free stuff since ministers don’t make a lot of money. They got free dental care but for some odd reason it did not include free tooth numbing. So you can figure out those kids were crazy about brushing their teeth so they didn’t need any fillings!
The downside of it, however, is you can’t drive yourself to/from the appointment, while with just nitrous, you’re fine a few minutes after they turn it off. Oh, and with the pill, I’d go home and sleep for hours afterward which could interfere with sleeping that night.