Christopher Sprout | One Surgeon, One Restoration: The Case for Doing Both
Why the dentist who places the implant and the one who finishes it should sometimes be the same person. Getting a dental implant can play out like a relay race. One clinician does the surgery to place the post in the bone. Another, sometimes months later, designs and seats the crown on top. The handoff is normal, and for many cases it works perfectly well. Christopher Sprout , a Colorado dentist who trained in implant dentistry at the Medical College of Georgia, has spent his career working both ends of that process. He will tell you the handoff carries a cost that patients almost never see. Closing the gap changes the result more than people tend to expect. The surgery and the crown are one conversation An implant is not two separate projects stacked neatly in sequence. Where the post goes in the bone decides what the crown on top is even able to be. The end is written quietly into the beginning. Angle the post a hair off and the final tooth has to compensate, sometimes in ways that s...