Dental Health Magazine Dental Health Digital Issue | Page 52

52
Issue #5, March 2017
CASE STUDY:
!
p
a
G
e
h
T
d
Min
CASE REPORT
INTRODUCTION
Often enough we see lots of patient who come to our clinics
wanting to replace a missing or an unsightly tooth in the
anterior part of the mouth. Usually the tooth missing is the
first or second upper incisors.
Traditionally the dentist can offer a bridge to fill this gap. That
means preparing the adjacent teeth which would often be
completely healthy teeth to support a bridge. Not only the
bridge preparation would mean an unwarranted destruction
of the adjacent teeth, but as in our case report below, it would
mean unacceptable aesthetics.
Mary (Not her real name) came to see
us 9 months ago for a consultation on
a missing tooth. Upon examination we
found that she was wearing an upper
denture after a loss of an upper right
central incisor. She had seen another
dentist from elsewhere and had replaced
the lost tooth with an extraordinarily big
tooth to cover the gap. She complained
that her plastic tooth looked odd as it
was bigger than her other teeth. Upon
further questioning we discovered that
she always had a gap between her front
incisor teeth, also known technically
as a median diastema. She was clearly
unhappy with the appearance and