Success of Denture Stabilisation


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If successfully installed and left to heal appropriately, dental implants have proven to last many years with proper post-surgical care. The success of the surgery itself is naturally a result of the skill and experience of the dentist or oral surgeon involved, as well as the oral health and hygiene of the patient being treated, and how much bone there is at the implant sites.

Oral surgeons or dentists with years of experience and training are more proficient at the surgery, and can better plan the surgery and adjust to any complications or difficulties encountered during a treatment. Oral surgeons in particular are specialists in dental procedures, and as such are linked to higher success rates in their treatments.


A patient’s oral hygiene has important consequences in terms of how long lasting the effects of treatment can be, how quickly the gums recovery, and the chances of infection. Patients with poorer oral health, and often a history of periodontal disease, will face a higher risk of infection as well as other complications like poorer recovery times and, quite often, a diminished amount of bone available for the implant surgery.

The amount of bone available for a dental implant surgery is extremely important as each implant is embedded within the bone and left to fuse to form a firm and long lasting structure. There needs to be a certain amount of bone to support these implants, and patients who have had missing teeth for some time, or a history of periodontal disease or some other conditions, can suffer from a lower than usual amount of jawbone. In these cases some implants may not be applicable at all, and certain implants designed to be applied to sites where there is less bone (like all-on-4 implants for example) will need to be used.

Critical to success is the post-surgical care regime which encourages recovery and reduces the risk of infection. A dentist or oral surgeon will often provide detailed instructions on how to care for a mouth recovering from implant surgery, and it is absolutely vital that these instructions are followed.

With all these factors in mind a number of different sources contend that the success rate for implant surgeries at present is about 75%. This figure is likely to improve as dental technologies and techniques improve in the years to come.

Key to their success as tools to stabilise artificial teeth is a successful procedure during which the implant fuses to the jawbone and everything heals as it should. Once the procedure itself has proven successful, then a dental implant will very effectively work as an anchorage to stabilise dentures and crowns. This is responsible for the improved bite strength and comfort implants can bestow on anyone with implants.

Causes of failure

There are a number of different mechanisms through which dental implant failure is thought to be caused, and many are to do with poor post-surgical care when patients don’t follow their dentist’s instructions on how to care for their mouth.

The most common cause for the failure of a dental implant surgery is linked to a poor fusion of bone and implant. This process is called osseointegration, and is needed to ensure that an implant is firmly and stably affixed to the jaw structure. After a healing period during which an implant is left to osseointegrate, said implant is assessed for a successful fusion. There are three criteria for implant failure in this area, the first being the loss of the implant from the site, the second is any sign of movement when the implant is stimulated, and the third and final criteria is the loss of more than 1mm of bone from around the site of implantation.

Dental implants can also fail if a particular condition arises in which there is substantial inflammation of the bone and/or mucosa at the site of implantation. This is known as peri-implantitis, which is a sign of infection in most cases. This ailment is more likely to affect heavy smokers who tend to suffer from weaker mucosal immunity, and people suffering from diabetes or periodontal disease. In truth this particular condition is not particularly well understood, and there is no clear method of effective treatment.

Smokers will experience a poorer success rate, and in many cases implants will only be offered if a patient has smoked smoking. Dental implant surgery is not only time consuming and uncomfortable due to the surgical nature of the procedure, it is also very expensive. It is often recommended that smokers take alternative dental prosthetics like bridges or partial dentures. These are less effective but pose a much smaller risk of infection and don’t carry the same risks associated with surgical implants.

A failed surgery will mean that an implant can no longer effectively stabilise prosthetic teeth. The points made in this section which indicate the failure of an implant procedure are all to do with an implant’s inability to effectively support prosthetics.

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Guide to Denture Stabilisation


Guide to Dental Implants in London & the UK




Further Information about Dental Treatment