Not too long ago, choosing a dental crown and the material that it should be made from were the biggest choices in restoring a compromised tooth. As a complete restoration that caps and protects all of your tooth’s crown structure, a traditional full dental crown can be the best solution for a wide range of concerns. Today, however, not all dental crowns are designed to completely cap teeth. By custom-designing a partial dental crown to restore only the damaged portion of your tooth, your dentist may help you regain your tooth’s health and integrity while simplifying your overall treatment.
What is a partial dental crown?
Traditional dental crowns are referred to as full dental crowns because they completely cover the teeth that they’re designed to restore. This enables the crown to restore a tooth that’s significantly damaged in order to prevent losing it or having to extract it. Partial dental crowns are crafted from the same durable and lifelike material as complete dental crowns, but do not completely cap the tooth’s crown structure. Instead, a partial crown (or inlay/onlay) can be designed to restore only the cracked, worn, or broken part of the tooth, eliminating the need to modify all of your tooth’s structure to prepare for the restoration.
Why not completely cap the tooth?
If a tooth experiences a significant level of wear or damage, meaning much of its crown structure has been compromised, then a full dental crown could be the best solution for restoring it. The point of a partial dental crown is to offer the same level of restoration for your tooth when its damage is less significant and doesn’t require completely restoring all of the tooth’s structure. This helps streamline your overall treatment process for a faster, minimally invasive procedure, and also helps you preserve a maximum amount of your healthy, natural tooth structure.
Choosing the right size crown for your tooth
The biggest difference between needing a full dental crown or a partial one is the extent of damage that each restoration can successfully save your tooth from. Because it caps your tooth entirely, a full dental crown may be most appropriate for significant levels of tooth damage, such as a fracture that extends through most of the tooth’s natural crown structure. Yet, a minor fracture, small chip in the tooth, excessive wear in a certain area, and other less extensive types of tooth damage may be treated more effectively with a custom-designed partial dental crown.
Learn if a partial or full crown can restore your tooth
Choosing between a partial and full dental crown depends largely on the extent of damage to your tooth, which your dentist will assess with a thorough dental examination. To learn more, contact our office by calling Syosset Dental in Syosset, NY, today at 516-433-2211 or 516-921-1678.
