Dental Crowns in Edison, NJ

We place two kinds of crown, and which one a tooth gets comes down to where it sits in your mouth and how hard you chew. You don't need to memorize this, because we'll tell you which we would use and why, but it's worth knowing a choice is being made on your behalf.

Crowns are billed as a major service, which on most dental plans means the plan covers part of the cost rather than most of it, and new plans sometimes hold a waiting period before that coverage starts at all. What you actually pay turns on your plan, your deductible, and how much of your annual maximum is left.

So we verify your benefits with your carrier before the appointment, and we give you the cost of the work before we start it. If the timing is wrong for you (a maximum that resets in January, say), tell us, because there's usually more than one way to sequence the work.

Two visits, about two weeks apart, and one of them is much shorter than the other.

The prep visit is done with the tooth numbed, so what you feel is pressure and vibration rather than pain. The fitting visit two weeks later usually needs nothing at all.

The honest discomfort is in between. A freshly prepped tooth can be sensitive to cold and to pressure for a few days, and a temporary often feels slightly bulky against the tongue until you stop noticing it, which most people do within a day.

A temporary crown is cemented with something deliberately weak, because it has to come off again in two weeks. Treat it accordingly: chew on the other side where you can, skip anything sticky (caramel, chewing gum, crusty bread), and when you floss that tooth, pull the floss out sideways rather than snapping it back up, or you'll lift the temporary off with it.

If it does come off, keep it and call us. It isn't an emergency, but don't leave the tooth bare for days: neighboring teeth drift, and a tooth that has drifted is a crown that no longer fits.

A bridge is this same procedure applied to a missing tooth. Crowns go on the teeth either side of the gap, joined to a replacement tooth in the middle, and we make them here on the same two-visit pattern in the same two materials.

A bridge asks the neighboring teeth to carry the extra load. That makes it a good answer when those teeth already need crowning anyway, and a weaker one when they're perfectly healthy. Where several teeth in a row are missing, dentures are usually the better conversation to have.