Your tooth broke.  All the way to the gumline.  This is something that most dentists see every week.  A patient comes in the office with a broken tooth (with or without prior root canal treatment) and they want their tooth to be fixed.  This is a big dilemma for dentists. 

In this situation, often there is not enough exposed tooth available to safely hold a crown.  Most of the time, the patient comes in with their crown in their hand, wondering if it can just be recemented!  A tooth typically needs at least 1.5 mm of ferrule (sound tooth structure around the base of the tooth) to have a long term restoration.  San Tan Valley AZ Dental Implants

So what happens?  The patient first has to be made aware of the issue and ramifications.  If the tooth has insufficient ferrule, its likely to fail.  So what is recommended?  If they are looking to restore a tooth, there are two good options. #martindental

The first, involves having the tooth orthodontically extruded.  After it stabilizes, a crown lengthening procedure can happen.  This makes the tooth have the desired amount of ferrule. 

Another option is to forgo orthodontic extrusion and just have a crown lengthening procedure.  This involves removing bone and gum from around the tooth, exposing more tooth structure.  It can work, but can cause aesthetic problems.  San Tan Valley AZ Dental Implants

Not all dentists will go along with these requests, mainly because it can lead to the eventual loss of the tooth. 

#smilewithconfidence So, what’s the other option?  Broken teeth can be extracted and have bone grafting and a dental implant placed while there is still sufficient bone available.  An implant restoration when placed in a good candidate, is the ideal treatment solution.