I would like to consider our dental practice, The Gentle Dentist, as a leader in providing quality dental care in Shelby Township, Michigan. I have been writing these monthly columns going on 10 years. I do my best to keep the readership of the Senior Living News informed and up to date on dental procedures and to be a resource to you and your loved ones. I graduated from the University of Michigan Dental School 25 years ago and have taken a multitude of continuing education courses to give me a very well rounded dental background. With this in mind, I would consider myself as an experienced and high quality dentist in the Shelby Township area. I am available to provide second opinions to those readers who have had some dental treatment plan proposed to them that just doesn’t seem right. I will spend about 15-20 minutes at no charge to give you my opinion of another dentist’s proposed treatment to put you at peace. There is no obligation with this service and have used the scenarios to gather information and insight into relevant topics to write on for future articles.
In fact, I had a patient come in the other day who had concerns that she was being over treated by her dentist. She said that the dentist told her that she had some holes in her gold crowns and they needed to be replaced. She had no pain and this didn’t make sense to her and because she was a long term reader she felt as if she needed this advice. Her question to me is how do holes form in gold crowns? I told her that her crowns were just fine and needed nothing except to brush better in the area. To answer her question about how holes develop into crowns is that they are usually very thin on the biting surface and over a long period of time they will wear out. Many times if this happens we will just repair the hole in the gold crown to seal off the inside of the crown to prevent food impacting and cavities forming in the hole. This is usually an adequate fix especially if there aren’t any cavities around the edges of the crown. Gold is the best restorative material we have and can last decades. Today they aren’t used much because people want tooth colored crowns and because of the cost of gold seems to make these materials a thing of the past.
If you do have questions about any proposed treatment that has been given to you or care that you aren’t satisfied with then give us a call at (586)247-3500 or email us at DrAntolak@TheGentleDentist.com.