Metal Mouth Message Board

Had two molars removed as part of the ortho treatment (one was a gone burger anyway) but the plan was to close the gaps up a little leaving enough room for implants.. grrrrrr found out today said implants will cost me around 10 THOUSAND! Considering I'm going through the dental school because I can't afford treatment elsewhere what options does that leave me!?

so sorry to hear that.....

just wanted to reply to let u kno that someone was listening to you.

On another note....if its molars at the back..cant the braces close off the space ?

Wow. And I thought implants were expensive here in the US. They ain't cheap, but I don't think they run $5k/piece.

thanks Nikki xo

Hi sirw.. Here's what the ortho said

"Yeah, you will most likely need to have a bone graft. We can ask them if they would do the graft during the procedure. The only issue with that is that the implants will need to be placed relatively soon after the grafting (about 8 weeks I think). It is the stimulation from the implants that will maintain the bone. If not, the grafted bone will also start to disappear. The implant cost is quite high. You could easily be looking at $10K or more for both implants (and crowns)."

As I understand it, implants can easily be more than $5000 per tooth (including crown), and I have always assumed that was without grafting. So the estimate may be a tad conservative :\

Sounds like you have been the victim of poor communication.

Assuming you have no wisdoms, you could ask them about the feasibility of having only one molar per quadrant. Or bridgework.

My single implant with grafting plus crown was somewhere around GBP 3k I think, I can't really remember (I've tried to block it out!).
Painfully expensive, but I had a giant abcess under the tooth (although it never hurt at all) so once I saw the x-ray there was no way I wasn't having it pulled!

My dentist let me pay in installments but it was still more painful on the wallet than the mouth...

What about a bridge?

I am in the same boat. I had a cleaning yesterday and talked to them about it. I keep hearing implants are better then bridges but implants are so expensive! I dont know what I am going to do yet but wanted to let you know that you arent alone. My ortho wants me to wait until my braces are done so I have a few more months but I feel like I need to prepare now.

All I have to say about implants vs. bridges is that bridges involve carving big chunks off of two otherwise-healthy teeth, and leave the pontic (the fake tooth-thing) just kind of resting on top of your gum.

If you can at all swing the expense, go with the implants.

agreed sirwired.. thanks sunshineray! xo

I'm going to talk with the uni and see if there's any way they can swing doing it cheaper for me :s

Bridges are cheaper, until you have to replace them after a certain number of years.