Overdentures go over natural teeth or over dental implants. Many patients suffer with ill fitting loose complete dentures that move or fall out when patients are speaking or eating. One solution is to construct a special type of dentures that goes over and attaches to something underneath. Keeping a few natural teeth or placing dental implants in the bone under the denture also helps keep the jaw bone healthy. This avoids much of the bone loss often seen in the jaw after teeth are removed.

Overdentures go over natural teeth. The cuspids are the longest teeth in the mouth and many patients who suffer from extensive tooth loss often have their cuspids. However, these patients usually have extensive bone loss so that there is much more of the cuspid tooth sticking out of the jaw bone than there is inside the bone. By doing a root canal and cutting the cuspid down to just above the gums, the ratio of tooth above the bone compared to inside the bone is greatly improved. A denture can be made that goes over and attaches to one or both cuspids.

Implant supported overdentures go on top of dental implants. A retainer bar or retention balls are placed on the implants and special attachments are inserted into the denture to grab onto these retention devices. A new method using mini implant dentures are becoming increasingly popular. Mini implants are very thin long titanium implants that screw into the jaw bone. They can be placed and old dentures can often be retrofitted to the implant heads.

Overdentures are a great dentures alternative and help eliminate many of the problems that denture wearers experience.