Is it okay for an elderly person to wear full dentures if all his teeth have fallen out?

The gums of the elderly gradually shrink, and at a certain age, all their teeth may fall out, which will seriously affect their health and gastrointestinal digestion. For the elderly, full dentures are generally chosen, which helps with chewing food and also helps with appearance. Of course, when installing full dentures, some issues should be paid attention to. For example, a small number of patients may experience pain, and the issues of occlusion and consolidation should also be taken seriously.

Some problems you may encounter when using full dentures.

1. The influence of psychological factors

Patients believe that wearing full dentures should be the same as wearing natural teeth, and they should have no problems speaking and eating. However, after wearing dentures, the patient's original imagination is often not exactly the same. When dentures are first worn, they tend to become loose and dislocated, they cannot be used for eating, pronunciation is unclear, and there is a lot of saliva.

2. Pain

1. Local problems on the tissue surface: Due to the compression of tissue by dentures, the mucosa becomes red, swollen, ulcerated and tender. When putting on or taking off dentures, the edge of the denture base often causes abrasions on the mucosa in the undercut area. Tissues can often be scratched due to uneven pressure when taking impressions or damage to the model.

2. Base edge: When the posterior edge of the maxillary denture is too long and the distal lingual edge of the mandibular denture is too long, symptoms of sore throat or pain when swallowing may often occur due to tissue compression.

3. Occlusion: There is premature contact or interference in the central occlusion and lateral aspects of the denture, and the force distribution is uneven, resulting in diffuse red irritation areas on the top of the alveolar ridge or on the inclined surface of the ridge.

4. Unstable dentures: When dentures are functioning, they are unstable, causing many tender spots and ulcers in the mouth. The causes of instability are excessive extension of the denture edge, incorrect tooth arrangement, incorrect jaw relationship, or interference of tooth tips when viewed laterally.

3. Poor retention

Poor retention of complete dentures is more common in the mandible, and the reasons are many. On the one hand, this is due to the poor oral conditions of the patient, such as the alveolar ridge becoming flat due to absorption and the mucosa being thinner. (After the teeth are extracted, the alveolar bone will soon shrink and become low-lying without the stimulation of the tooth roots.) On the other hand, it is due to problems with the denture itself, such as the base of the denture not fitting tightly against the gums, the base being too long or too large; the denture being improperly positioned or unbalanced, etc.

4. Poor chewing function

The reason why complete dentures have poor chewing function is often due to the small contact area between the upper and lower teeth, or the loss of the proper facial anatomical morphology during the occlusal adjustment process. Due to the low vertical distance, patients feel that they cannot exert enough strength when eating and eat slowly.

5. Pronunciation disorders

Generally speaking, when full dentures are first worn, pronunciation is often unclear, but one will be able to adapt and overcome it quickly. If the artificial teeth are not positioned correctly, the pronunciation will be unclear or there will be a whistling sound. The whistle sound is caused by the narrowness of the posterior dental arch, especially in the bicuspid area, which reduces the space for tongue movement, restricts tongue movement, and forms a very small air escape channel between the back of the tongue and the palate. The palatal surface of the front of the base is too smooth, and the lingual surface of the front teeth is too smooth, which can also cause the whistle sound.

6. Nausea

Some patients often experience nausea or even vomiting when they first wear dentures. The common reasons are that the posterior edge of the maxillary denture is too long or the posterior edge of the denture base is not in close contact with the oral mucosa. Nausea is caused by saliva irritating the mucous membrane; the upper and lower front teeth are in contact but the tips of the back teeth are not, and the back end of the denture tilts and irritates the mucous membrane, which can also make the patient feel nauseous; the posterior edge base of the maxillary denture is too thick, and the distal lingual base of the mandibular denture is too thick, which squeezes the tongue and can also cause nausea; menopausal patients are also often prone to symptoms of nausea from wearing dentures.