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Question:
Fitting crows to help Bruxism: I have bruxisn which has recently caused problems.
I had to have a major repair to a crown and a complicated tooth removal because of the tooth fractures. I went to another dentist because I felt my current dentist was nervous working on me because of the problems I have with bruxism.
The new dentist advised me to have 4 perfectly good teeth on the lower front of my mouth crowned as the wear on some of these teeth was not protecting my molars and I was in danger of losing more molars. He explained the porcelain of crowns was tougher than teeth and so would aid the protection of the remaining molars.
Now I feel angry having these good teeth crowned. Is this a normal proceedure against bruxism? ...Visitor from Spain
Answer:
The dentist who is proposing crowning the lower front teeth is going in the right direction.
If your teeth are so worn down and taking so much stress that you are breaking teeth and need to have one extracted, I think that you may need more that just 4 crowns.
These are probably not perfectly good teeth. They are worn down and unable to do their job in your bite. The front teeth should touch if you line them up (bottom of upper front teeth to top of lower front teeth). In this position, none of your back teeth should touch.
I suspect that your front teeth are worn enough that all of your teeth, front and back, touch when you try to line up the front ones. Your front teeth are not protecting your back teeth, and that's why your teeth are breaking. I will bet that your eye teeth are concave, not pointed.
I suspect that crowning the lower 4 teeth in porcelain will not be enough. I think that you might seek another opinion from a dentist who has trained at LVI (the Las Vegas Institute for Advanced Dental Studies) or Pankey Institute in Florida.
I think that you probably need crowns on all of your teeth and to have your bite totally changed. I am afraid that 4 lower crowns, especially in porcelain, will also break and you will have another problem.
I would be very wary of using porcelain crowns in somebody who has already caused a lot of damage to his teeth. I would advise you to look for somebody with special training in occlusion (bites) and full mouth reconstruction. Most LVI doctors will have the courses they attended on their websites.
If I am right, this will be very expensive, but most dentists should have financing available. At the very least, you need a night guard to protect your teeth ASAP.
Corinne Scalzitti, DMD, MAGD
Austin Reconstructive Implant Dentistry
3900 RR 620 South
Austin, Texas TX 78738
(512) 263-3330
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