I had a dental implant placed. It seemed like something was loose. I went back to the dentist. He told me the x-rays looked good, so that meant it was the crown that was loose. He said it was a simple matter of recementing my crown. When he tried to remove the loose crown, it was stuck pretty solid. He used a special tool to remove it, but when he did, the implant came out with it. Did he make a mistake?
Sophie L.- Ohio
Sophie,
This is going to come off pretty strong. Not only did you dentist make a mistake, it borders on gross negligence. It is much easier to fix a loose crown than a loose implant. It seems like he was trying to cover up the loose implant by just re-cementing a crown. He should have known that it wasn’t the crown the moment it wasn’t coming off.
There are several reasons for a loose dental implant. Two of the major ones are infection and premature placement. I don’t suspect an infection for you because you haven’t mentioned any pain. Premature placement is a possibility. After the implant is placed, there needs to be a period of healing time to allow the bone to grow around the implant. This is called osseointegration. If there wasn’t enough time allowed for the bone to grow, the implant would not be able to handle the stress of the dental crown and would come loose.
To fix this, you’ve got a bigger problem than merely replacing the implant. The bone will have to be filled back in, or there will be no way to support the implant. You’ll need some bone grafting done. You have a lot of legal leverage to have the dentist pay for the entire procedure to be done again correctly.
This blog is brought to you by Seattle Dentist Dr. Brian McKay.
