Until now, a dental extraction, bone graft, and implant process could sometimes take as long as a year. Thanks to the use of platelet-rich fibrin in dental bone grafting, explains Dr. Frank Mitchell, DDS, same-day extractions and implants—also known as immediate-load implants—are becoming a reality!
Transcript:
We’re actually placing an implant in the extraction site with PRF and bone graft material around it; and then with our CEREC technology, we’re able to do the finished crown, in certain select instances.
So give an example—if I were a patient coming in, how this would work out for me. Like, how would I learn about it? What would you tell me?
If you had a catastrophic defect with a natural tooth, in certain instances you can remove that tooth, and provide the patient with a new restoration that as closely duplicates the natural tooth as possible. You can actually—one of the incredible things is we’re rebuilding the patient’s own native structure as closely as we possibly can. I love the CEREC technology that we have, our CAD/CAM fabrication of crowns. And so we can use one of those crowns on an artificial root, which in the past, you know, wasn’t possible, and currently that’s just amazing.
So how many times would I have to come, how many times would I have had to make—
One visit.
No, in the past. How many?
Well, there are many patients that have had their treatment extended out for a year.
And now in one visit you’re done?
So, many times you would have an appointment where you would have the tooth removed and maybe bone grafting done at that appointment, but sometimes the bone grafting would be done later. There then would be the implant placement, and there would be months of waiting. I’ve had a number of patients wait over a year. With specialists we’re starting to do our own in-house implant placement, and there are many trends within the world that we need to pay attention to, so outside of the United States—in Asia in particular—they’re placing immediate-load implants. That’s a fascinating area of dentistry, and it’s almost magic. I’m really excited about that in particular.