The Common Problem with Dentures
While dentures may seem to be the best solution for maintaining a smile with age, there can be some problems associated with dentures that you need to be aware of before you decide that this is the right option for you. So today on the blog, Victory Dental wanted to talk about common denture problems to keep in mind, as well as some solutions to help you navigate them.
Make Sure You Keep Your Dentures Clean
While dentures can be a great solution, they must be properly cleaned in order to remain germ-free and healthy. Imagine a cesspool of old germs just lingering around dentures that aren’t thoroughly maintained, and you can understand how disgusting this could be.
A person with dentures need to make sure that they are maintaining their oral health—brushing, rinsing their gums and mouth out with mouthwash, etc. If you don’t, you can run into oral health problems like gum disease and other issues. With that being said, dentures can be hard to clean—especially if you have wrist problems or arthritis.
To clean your dentures, you need to brush them every day. Be sure to remove them from your mouth very carefully when you do this, because you don’t want them to drop. You want to brush them with multi-action toothbrush and anti-abrasive cleaner. Do not use regular toothpaste, because they can be too abrasive. You can also use mild hand soap or dishwasher fluid if you’d like.
Make Sure You Get Your Dentures Sized Properly
Dentures need to really fit your mouth or they will not be very comfortable. So make sure that you get them sized appropriately. If you lose or gain a lot of weight, that can affect your dentures, so keep that in mind if you tend to fluctuate weight—because you will need to get your dentures re-sized or re-fitted.
Always be in communication with your dentist, and your dentist will help you adjust as necessary to make sure that you have the overall best experience.
Dentures Are Difficult to Eat and Talk With
Because dentures are not permanently fixed to your teeth, they may give a little when you move your mouth in actions like chewing or talking. When you eat, foods can tend to get stuck in your dentures, and hard foods may break your dentures if you’re not careful. So be very conscious of this. When talking, they can cause trouble—leading to some embarrassment when you can’t completely talk straight.
Our office does not recommend having all your lower teeth extracted and the placement of a lower denture without at least two implants to hold it in place. Without the implants the denture will flop around causing a miserable situation of unhappiness.
When you first get dentures, eat softer foods so that you can get used to chewing with them. Eventually with more practice, you will be able to eat most foods that you enjoy. You can also practice talking in private before you have to talk in front of people to continue practicing using your dentures. You can learn to speak quite naturally if you give yourself time to learn how to use your dentures.
As always, everything takes some adjustment—so you will most likely adjust to your dentures and live a great life! Contact Victory Dental with any questions or concerns surrounding dentures, and we will be glad to help you.