Dear LPG,

I suppose I see myself as a relatively normal pensioner, and as such, I have spent a fair amount of time in the dentist’s chare listening to the drill over the years.  When I was young, I used my teeth as a substitute for the odd bottle opener and nutcracker while my love for attacking the odd chicken bone has also taken its toll. 

I am now in my 60s, and so are my teeth.  I am sure that I am not alone when I say that, just like the rest of me, they have been showing the signs of wear and tear for a while now.   It has been happening gradually while I have been ignoring the fallout but last week, I experienced something even more terrifying than the sound of the drill; the loss of the fourth whole tooth to be extracted.  Apparently many people have this experience much earlier in life than me, and I do feel lucky because, until now, there has been no gap in my smile (the other three missing teeth are at the back of my mouth).

My big question is should I go for implants or dentures?   I have friends who are doing the implant thing and I am sure that I am not the only older person to watch that programme with the funny film clips where the old lady manages to spit out her dentures while trying to blow out the many candles on her cake.

I am determined never to become that old lady and so, not wanting to sound really silly when I next visit the dentist, I thought I should visit forearmed.  The obvious thing to do was to take a trip around the internet but I found that nearly all of the information there is offered by dentists who are trying to sell their services and I wanted an impartial answer to my questions. 

The Oral Health Foundation is one of the few impartial agencies I found to talk to and their website is also very enlightening. 

They told me that you have to have really healthy gums to have implants and once they are in they are nearly always in for life.  They are not really painful and are usually stronger than natural teeth.

They are screwed into your jaw although there is rarely one screw per tooth, and if you are diabetic it is likely that they may not be suitable for you.  If you have a good tooth between two bad ones it might be worth having the good one out and having all three implanted together.  At about £2000 per tooth, they are quite expensive although I have found many visits to the dentist about my dentures cost quite a bit too.

The last bit of advice that I was given was that in the UK there are some dentists who will offer a free consultation and it is a good idea to have at least two dentists make an assessment so that you are really sure that you are getting accurate information, because there are a lot of organisations charging lots of different prices for this service at the moment.  

I found their advice really helpful and finished the call much more informed than I started it although I have still to make up my mind about what I am going to do. 

YS, Beckenham

LPG found some information offered by the NHS and YS asked us to share the website and telephone number of their dental helpline (01788 539 78o)…

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