Recovered From A Drug Addiction And Want To Recover Your Smile Too? Tips For You
When you are in the process of recovering from a drug addiction, you begin to realize more clearly all of the damage that you have done to your overall health and well-being in all aspects of your life. However, one of the most outwardly noticeable signs of physical drug addiction damage that spans all different types of drug abuse and addiction is the problem of damaged teeth. Oral health often gets neglected when a person is addicted to drugs and the drugs themselves can cause extensive tooth damage. If you are a recovered drug addict and are looking for ways to restore and improve your smile, cosmetic dentistry and general dentistry can help you in a large number of ways.
Full Teeth Cleaning and Professional Whitening
The first step you will want to take when you have recovered from a drug addiction is to go to a dentist and have your teeth inspected and cleaned. The dentist will examine your teeth and let you know if any cavities or infections need to be immediately resolved. They will also clean your teeth thoroughly.
Once all of the health issues of cavities and infections are resolved, you can also go to a cosmetic dentist for professional teeth whitening treatments. The combination of a thorough dental cleaning and professional whitening treatments is the fastest way to remove plaque and stains from your teeth that were caused by your past drug abuse. This is because dentist tools can get down into all of the cracks and crevices of your teeth to remove any plaque buildup and the whitening chemicals that are used are of the highest strength possible to have maximum impact.
Dental Implants or Bridges to Replace a Few Missing Teeth
If over the course of your drug addiction you also lost a tooth or two, you may want to look into ways to fix your smile through dental prosthetics. A dental prosthetic device is essentially a tooth replacement that looks like a natural tooth to maintain the structure and aesthetic of your smile.
Two of the best options for a person who have a few missing teeth here and there are dental implants or dental bridges. Dental bridges are artificial teeth that are suspended across the space from the missing tooth or teeth (much like a bridge over water). Dental bridges are attached to the teeth immediately adjacent to the open space through filing down the teeth and using a bonding material to adhere the bridge to the teeth.
Dental implants are another option for a dental prosthesis and are devices that are more like an actual tooth. The implant is actually attached to the facial bone that holds a person's teeth in place and acts as the root of the tooth. This implant sticks out just a little past the line of the gums and a full artificial tooth is attached to that implant abutment.
With these options in mind, you can begin to see how visiting a cosmetic dentists can help you to recover your smile after you have accomplished the monumental feat of overcoming your addiction to drugs. These are just some of the many options that will help you make your smile as bright and radiant as possible so you should call a cosmetic dentist, like one from Carolina Forest Family Dentistry, to get started as soon as possible.