If you’re considering investing in high-end dentures, you might understand the difference in cost, but not know what that means for your denture experience. It is a very different thing getting fitted for high end dentures versus something that is just affordable. Here’s how high-end dentures provide a more satisfying experience from start to finish.

mature adult woman smiling with teeth

The Basics of the Dentures Process

To some extent, the dentures process has the same basic steps whether you’re getting traditional dentures or high-end dentures. These steps include:

  • Consultation
  • Impressions
  • Design
  • Manufacturing
  • Try-in
  • Adjustments
  • Final delivery

During the consultation, your denturist will talk to you about your cosmetic and functional goals for your dentures.

Next, your dentist will take impressions for fitting your dentures. We’ll talk more about what makes this part of the process different for high-end dentures vs. low-quality dentures.

Once you have impressions, your dentist will combine what they know from your consultation with the impressions to work up a denture design. You may or may not get an opportunity to provide additional input at this stage. You may also get to try on some test dentures at this stage.

For most dentures, your dentist will send the design and impressions to a dental lab, which will manufacture your dentures. However, for some traditional dentures, a dentist has a stock of “blanks” at their office and will simply fit them immediately.

After manufacturing, you will have a chance to try your new dentures. Hopefully, these fit perfectly. However, if there are some problems, your denturist may be able to make adjustments. With lower quality dentures, your ability to get adjustments may be minimal.

Once you and your dentist are satisfied with your dentures, you will take final delivery.

Being Welcomed

Your different experience begins the moment you enter your denturist’s office. At best, for your traditional denture fitting, you can expect rushed courtesies. Other times, your denturist may look at you as if you’re a burden. Denturist who do low quality work are often not happy with it. It’s something they do for purely financial reasons, and it’s not that well compensated. So their goal is to get you in and out quickly. They don’t expect you to become a regular patient–and probably don’t want you to.

A FOY® Dentures dentist, on the other hand, has sought out this denture technique because it makes their dentures fit in with the rest of their practice in terms of delivering excellent, customized results. They want to get to know you, and will take the time to do so. They want to know what you want from your dentures.

During your consultation, you will talk to your denturist about the functional and cosmetic goals for your dentures. They will want to know your personality, and how your dentures can fit your personality, including whether you want to restore your youthful smile or if you’d rather get the smile of your dreams.

Being Fitted

Your fitting for low-end dentures will be cursory. You’ll be measured and the denture that “fits” your mouth will be taken from the lineup. We put “fits” in quotation marks because with a lineup of dentures that contains anywhere from three to eight premade sizes, it’s quite likely that none of them really fits your mouth in the literal sense of the word. These dentures mayl be filled with an impression compound, then pressed into your gums.

Primarily, the concern is fitting your dentures to your gums. Other aspects of your bite system are taken into account–if at all–using quick guides and rules of thumb that may or may not be right for your bite.

FOY® Dentures on the other hand, are fitted carefully, taking the time to account for the individualized aspects of your bite. Measurements of your current bite are taken carefully, and your current denture is analyzed for its role in contributing to any bite problems. Your entire first visit is dedicated to measuring your mouth and your bite.

FOY ® Dentures dentists even take dynamic impressions. In this technique, a denturist stimulates your jaw muscles so that they can track how these muscles move. This helps ensure that jaw movement won’t dislodge your dentures.

The fitting occurs at the next visit, a comprehensive try-in that allows your denturist to account for any irregularities or problems in the measurement process. Your dentures are fitted completely with a wax try-in before they are finalized. This means that when the final dentures arrive, they are more likely to fit properly.

Getting Adjustments

When you show up to get adjustments for your dentures, any courtesy you were shown at your first visit is likely gone, along with adherence to basic customer service principles. Now a denturist sees each additional visit not as the return of a friend or even a patient, but as a sap on the already thin profit margin that comes with low-quality dentures. They may also be anxious because their denture training didn’t give them the tools to properly adjust your dentures. Traditional dentures are more likely to need adjustments, but the dentists that provide them are often not willing or even able to perform adjustments. The news is littered with stories of people who have been “cut off” by their denturist, who just refuses to see them anymore.

On the other hand, your FOY® Dentures dentist will be happy to see you. They don’t mind performing adjustments to make sure that you are happy and comfortable in your dentures–that’s their goal. Ironically, because of the precise nature of fitting your dentures in the first place, you’re less likely to need follow-up visits.

Staying Fitted

Because your dentures are likely not properly fitted, they won’t last as long as you would like. Dentures don’t “wear in” the way you might expect with something like a pair of shoes. Instead, they wear out at the same time as they create pathological bone loss, resulting in the loss of fit. People who buy lower-quality dentures may have a drawer full of old dentures as they go through them quickly.

On the other hand, your high-end dentures are designed to last. They are designed to reduce pressure points that can accelerate bone loss, or, if you have implant dentures, to retain your jaw bone. With non-implant dentures, you will still need to get refits as your body loses bone, but they shouldn’t be as frequent or as drastic, which means that you can keep your denture for longer.

Learn the Difference High End Dentures Can Make

If you want to learn more about the difference between traditional dentures and high-end dentures, please contact a local FOY® denturist for an appointment today.