Prosthodontics

Prosthodontics is a subspecialty of dentistry that focuses on the restoration and replacement of missing or damaged teeth and other oral tissues to maintain health, function, comfort and esthetics.

Injury, disease, congenital defects, joint and sleep disorders, neglect, and years of day-to-day wear can all cause significant damage to the teeth or their outright loss. Stained, chipped, worn, broken or missing teeth can be restored to their natural appearance so you can continue to enjoy a beautiful smile. The various methods of restoration include crowns (caps) and onlays, veneers, inlays, fixed bridges, dental implants, and various removable dentures.

Full Mouth Rehabilitation and Comprehensive Treatment

Dr. Kay is trained and experienced in a broad range of highly specialized techniques needed to successfully and smoothly accomplish the return of a patient with a severely compromised dentition to good health, function, comfort and appearance. As a Prosthodontist, he has been choosing the best and safest of these reconstructive techniques for his many patients for over two dozen years. He is proud to have patients from over ten foreign countries as well as twenty States.

Dental Implants - Crowns and Onlays - Veneers and Inlays - Bridges - CEREC^® Restorations

Dental Implants

Dental implants are artificial replacements for missing roots of teeth. Typically they are approximately root-shaped and made of the metal Titanium. They allow for support of artificial teeth such as crowns, bridges, or dentures in situations where teeth were lost or never developed. The success of dental implants is very well documented and they are considered the standard of care for the replacement of missing teeth. In our office implants are surgically placed by an experienced clinical team who have been working together for many years. We practice to the highest standards and chose the best techniques and materials for the patient in the given situation.

Crowns and Onlays

Crown and onlay restorations, colloquially also called caps, are used to improve the strength, shape, size or color of teeth. They can protect and support broken or weak teeth or those with large fillings; provide a smooth, strong, attractively contoured artificial surface for broken, stained, misshapen or otherwise abnormal teeth; and used as a part of a bridge to replace missing teeth. Crowns and onlays are often recommended for teeth after root canal filling procedures to strengthen them. Crowns are also used with implants to provide new dentition, which functions like the natural teeth, where natural teeth had been lost. Crowns and onlays can be made of ceramic (porcelain), various noble metals such as gold, palladium, and platinum alloys, or a layered combination of the two depending on what is best in the situation.

Veneers and Inlays

Veneers are thin pieces of ceramic (porcelain) or composite which are bonded to teeth in order to modify their shape or color. Inlays are similar small pieces of ceramic or composite usually used to restore the chewing surface of the back teeth. They are used when the tooth restored is mostly intact and does not need a crown restoration to accomplish the desired results.

Bridges (fixed partial dentures)

Bridges are nonremovable natural-looking tooth replacements which help maintain facial structure, reduce stress on the jaw and fill in the gaps caused by missing teeth. They are strings of crowns joined together and supported by teeth or dental implants. Fixed bridges are cemented to the existing teeth or to implants and are not removable. Removable partial dentures (sometimes called removable bridgework) can be taken out daily for cleaning.

CEREC^® Restorations

Our office is equipped and has been providing CEREC^® CAD-CAM restorations for over three years. We have restored hundreds of teeth with this revolutionary technique that allows the patient to have a strong, well-fitting, esthetic porcelain crown, onlay, inlay, veneer or other similar restoration to be done in a single visit. The tooth is scanned with a special camera, and no impression need be made. We design all aspects of the crown on the computer screen. Then restorations are precisely milled out of color-matched porcelain blocks by a robot on the premises. In addition to the resulting restoration being superior to many alternative conventional treatment methods such as amalgams (silver fillings) or composites, and to the exceptional convenience, the method is also particularly environment-friendly since most of the processing is done in the memory of the CEREC^® machine without a waste stream associated with conventional techniques.

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All of the Crowns, Bridges, Veneers, Inlays, Onlays, Dentures and other restorations used in our office are made of the finest materials available. They are all made locally by the most reputable technicians and high quality dental laboratories in Massachusetts. None of our work ever goes offshore.

Dental Implants - Crowns and Onlays - Veneers and Inlays - Bridges - CEREC^® Restorations