What is the end-stage edentulous reckoning that most dentists never see?
The day arrives, for patients living long enough in removable prosthetics, when no further denture can be fabricated. Bone resorption continues year after year under a denture worn against the ridges. The patient’s remaining mandibular bone reduces to a pencil-thin structure. The maxillary ridges flatten to nonexistent. Their physiological ability to adapt to a removable prosthetic declines with age alongside the bone loss. At a certain point, even the most skilled prosthodontist cannot fabricate a denture the patient can wear and function with. The clinical situation has crossed into territory where the only path forward is reconstruction at the extreme end of complexity: iliac crest grafts to rebuild the bone height needed to place implants, performed by the small handful of surgeons capable of that work. Estimates put fewer than 100 surgeons on the planet able to do it. Most patients at that point cannot travel, cannot afford the work, and cannot survive the recovery. They live out their remaining years unable to eat normally. The reckoning is preventable upstream. Marketing and ethical case acceptance should catch these patients before they go over the cliff.
If the answers you are finding here resonate with you, my team and I work with a small group of clients each year. The next step is a complimentary Discovery Consultation and Practice Review with Dr. McAnally.