Dental Crowns Phoenix
A Royal Repair for Damaged Teeth
Do you have a cracked, broken, or decayed tooth that’s detracting from your appearance and dental health? Once the structure is compromised, you should treat your troubled tooth sooner rather than later to avoid potential infection, contagious cavities, and additional injuries.
Fortunately, our Smile Fitness Dental Center Team has a royal repair for damaged teeth with dental crowns. Continue reading to learn more about these remarkable restorations, and feel free to contact us for additional information.
What is a Dental Crown?
Dental crowns are customizable tooth-shaped caps that cover, protect, and restore a tooth that’s too far gone to be treated effectively with a filling. Depending on your needs, they can be made of various materials, like porcelain, resin, metal, or porcelain-fused-to-metal.
These covers are designed to match the shade, shape, and size of your natural teeth and then are cemented over them to preserve them in circumstances that might otherwise require extraction and replacement. They’re also included on each side of a dental bridge to anchor it in place or can cover a dental crown or misshapen tooth to refurbish your grin.
The Dental Crown Process
Before being fitted with a dental crown, you must consult with one of our providers to ensure you’re a good candidate. Our team will update your medical history and examine your mouth to determine whether any additional services, like gum disease therapy, might be required before moving forward.
Next, we’ll prepare your tooth by removing a small amount of enamel so that your prosthetic fits correctly. Once that’s complete, we’ll make impressions and take images, then send them to a special dental lab to build your new tooth to your unique specifications. It can take a couple of weeks to arrive, so we’ll place a temporary crown to shield your smile in the meantime.
Once the final restoration arrives, we’ll replace the short-term solution with the real deal. Then, we’ll remove any excess cement and check the fit to make sure you can bite down comfortably before sending you on your way.
The Benefits of Getting a Dental Crown
There are several advantages to getting a dental crown in Phoenix, including:
- Boost your confidence. Covering an unsightly tooth with a prosthetic made from lifelike materials helps you look and feel like the best version of yourself.
- Improved chewing ability. Cracked teeth can make it difficult or uncomfortable to grind your food thoroughly enough to be easily swallowed and digested. Covering them up can restore your bite force.
- Preserves dental health. Caring for them is as easy as brushing and flossing twice daily and visiting our team every six months for a routine checkup, decreasing your vulnerability to tooth decay and gum disease.
- Versatile treatment. You can mend or mask one or several imperfections with a single prosthetic like chips, cracks, stains, or misshapen teeth.
- Long-lasting treatment. These restorations can last 15+ years if they’re cared for correctly.
Understanding the Cost of Dental Crowns
While a dental crown may be the best way to restore the health and function of your tooth, it’s perfectly reasonable that you would want to know how much you can expect to pay for it before you commit to the treatment. Here’s a brief overview of how dental crown treatment is priced at Smile Fitness Dental Centers, but the best way to know how much your appliance will cost is to schedule a consultation at our office so we can give you a proper estimate.
Factors That Affect the Cost of Dental Crowns
Most of the cost of your dental crown treatment will be determined by a few major factors such as:
- The severity of the damage.
- The need for preliminary procedures to remove decayed dental structure such as a root canal.
- The type of material the crown is made from. A few possible examples include porcelain, gold, and amalgam.
- The method used to manufacture the crown. Some dentists use techniques that take less time but are more expensive.
It’s important to keep in mind that, with dental crowns as with everything else, you can expect to get what you pay for. A high-quality crown that looks good, fits right, and functions well can preserve your damaged tooth and your oral health.
Does Dental Insurance Cover Dental Crowns?
Most insurance policies consider dental crowns to be necessary restorative treatments, so they will usually cover them at about 50%. However, each dental plan is different, so it is important to understand exactly what your policy will pay for before you commit to the treatment. Our team in Phoenix will gladly help you go over your insurance plan so you can maximize your benefits.
Options for Making Dental Crowns Affordable
It might be difficult to fit a dental crown into your budget if you are uninsured or underinsured. That’s why we offer several options to make these restorative treatments more affordable, such as:
- Flexible financing options through CareCredit: These payment plans can break your overall bill into small monthly installments that are easy to manage.
- Membership plan: For a low annual fee, you can gain access to necessary preventive treatments and one emergency exam as well as 20% off all procedures completed at our practice including dental crowns.
During your consultation, our team will be sure to provide you with a cost estimate and help you navigate your payment and financing options. Contact our office to schedule your consultation today.
Dental Crowns FAQs
Are Dental Crowns Permanent?
These tooth-shaped caps are intended to protect injured teeth from additional harm while simultaneously improving your smile’s appearance and functionality. However, many patients wonder if they’re removable, like dentures.
Usually, dental crowns are considered long-lasting rather than permanent because, though they’re durable, they might eventually wear down and require replacement. That said, they’re not intended to be removed or reinserted.
What Are Dental Crowns Made From?
These prosthetics are a versatile solution that our team near Phoenix can place to upgrade your grin’s aesthetics and your ability to eat and speak normally. Depending on your needs and budget, they can be created from various materials. Some potential options include:
- Historically, most dental restorations were made from amalgam mixtures of different metals like silver, nickel, and palladium. These can be pretty durable, but can make your teeth look gray, so they’re often preferred for molars in the back of your mouth.
- All-ceramic options today are just as resilient as metal and can be customized to be just the right shape, shade, and size to match your natural teeth seamlessly.
- This option is often less expensive, but doesn’t usually last as long as metal or porcelain, though it can be customized to boost your confidence.
- Porcelain-fused-to-metal. This combination results in a restoration that is both incredibly long-lasting and beautiful.
How Long Do Dental Crowns Typically Last?
Usually, you can expect your new tooth to last anywhere from 5 to 15 or more years, but it depends significantly on your unique circumstances. Some factors that can impact their longevity include:
- Your dental hygiene. Brushing and flossing twice daily removes bacteria and debris that can erode the tooth that’s holding your crown in place.
- Their material. Metal and porcelain tend to last longer and resist damage better than resin.
- Their location. Restorations covering molars tend to sustain additional harm from chewing pressure and might chip, break, or become dislodged sooner than one covering a front tooth.
- Your diet. Eating overly hard and sticky foods can break or dislodge your crown and should be avoided.
- Other habits. Smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol can harm the cement holding your prosthetic in place, and biting your nails, pen caps, or other inanimate objects could chip or crack them.
What Signs Let Me Know I Need a New Dental Crown?
Your dental cover isn’t likely to last forever, but it can be hard to know when it needs to be repaired or replaced. The following indicators let you know that it’s time to invest in a new restoration:
- You might feel sensitive after your enamel is thinned to place your crown, but severe or persistent pain is abnormal. Contact our Smile Fitness Dental Center team right away to let us know if you’re hurting, so we can check that your prosthetic fits correctly.
- A loose or wobbling cap could be due to damaged cement. If it feels loose, especially when eating anything sticky, give us a call.
- It looks Worn. One benefit of having a dental crown is that it hides your injured tooth to improve your appearance, and if it’s overly stained, damaged, or stunted, it might be worth getting a new one.
- Dark line at the base. As porcelain-fused-to-metal prosthetics wear down, the amalgam base shines through near your gums where the ceramic layer is thinnest. If you’re self-conscious about the way it looks, it might be at the end of its lifespan.