David Schwab: Welcome to the Schwab Report. This is David Schwab. Today my guest is Dr. Jason Denise. Dr. Denise is a cosmetic and restorative dentist, and he joins me today from his office in Annapolis, Maryland.
Dr. Denise, I noticed sometimes in conversations among patients, a patient might say, “You know I’m missing a tooth in the back of my mouth. It’s all the way in the back. It’s not noticeable. So why would I be concerned about having that missing tooth replaced? I mean no one is ever going to see it.” What do you say to those patients?
Dr. Denise: Oh, that’s a good question. There are several important reasons why missing a back tooth is a problem. The first one I would say is that when you lose a tooth, studies show that within the first year you will begin to lose bone from where that tooth was. So if that person changes their mind at some point in the future they may not be able to elect to have an implant.
Secondly, other confounding factors occur. When you lose a tooth, you can have rotations or shifting of the adjacent teeth and you can also have continued eruption of the tooth that was the antagonist of that tooth.
So all of these things actually can begin a downward spiral with the rest of your mouth, losing one tooth could lead to other dental problems.
David Schwab: I’m going to pick up on something you just said. I think many people think that if they’re missing one tooth it’s an isolated event. But you seem to be saying that if they’re missing one tooth, and they don’t do anything about it, it creates sort of a domino effect and they may have many dental problems as a result. Is that right?
Dr. Denise: That’s absolutely correct. And I can tell you that I’ve seen it. The teeth in the back of the mouth are designed for chewing, and when you lose a tooth in the back of the mouth that chewing force is transferred elsewhere. So you begin to damage other teeth also.
David Schwab: I would like to thank Dr. Denise for joining us today. Dr. Denise is accepting new patients, and he may be contacted through his website annapolisdds.com.
This is David Schwab, thanks for watching.
