Westboro Dentist Uses 3D Digital Imagery to Better Treat You
Dentistry has always been a realm of innovation. When the first dental drills were made, thousands of years ago, they might have been praised as the greatest technological achievements of their time – or they would have been, if anesthetics had been discovered at the same time (instead, most people probably just said, “Ow!”). From then until now, our understanding of what is good or bad for teeth, and how your oral health affects your overall health, has constantly advanced and evolved. Fittingly, so have treatment methods. When you visit your local Westboro dentist today, instead of a stone drill, you’ll see stainless steel tools, motorized handpieces, and advanced 3D digital dentistry equipment.
3D Digital Imaging: What’s the Big Deal?
Our ancestors didn’t have the benefit of being able to easily map out the entire mouth of a living person when they performed dental surgery. Whether pulling teeth or replacing them, they had to feel their way around, look for clues, and fill in the rest with educated guesses. This obviously affected the success rate of treatment – even the best-trained dentists can’t treat what they can’t detect. The invention of the X-ray in 1895 helped dentists begin to fill in the blanks and detect problems in the roots of teeth and the alveolar bones around them. Today, digital dentistry has allowed dentists to create a complete three-dimensional image of a patient’s teeth, surrounding bones, and tissues.
How Your Westboro Dentist Uses 3D Imaging to Provide Better Treatment
If you’ve lost a tooth—or several—then you’re probably considering having dental implants. Apart from replacing what’s been lost, implants also help prevent bone degeneration in your jaw. But this is a two-edged sword, because the success of the implant may also depend on the health of those bones. When your dentist has the power to see a detailed representation of your jaw in three dimensions, they can make informed decisions on how best to treat you, removing guesswork and thereby reducing the margin of error.
Digital dentistry also helps improve treatment by creating an opportunity for what is called “backwards planning.” In any context, backwards planning refers to the practice of beginning a process at the end, so that you can better create a plan of how to get there from where you currently are. By creating a 3D model of a patient’s teeth, a dentist can create a visual representation of the desired end product of treatment, to be agreed upon with the patient. With this representation in mind, your Westboro dentist can more efficiently plan your treatment and help you achieve optimal oral health. Now isn’t that something to smile about?
