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The Ultimate Guide To Dental Crowns in 2021

The Ultimate Guide To Dental Crowns in 2021

We reside in an age where money can virtually buy anything, including a brilliant smile. Dental crowns have long been an answer to reviving a damaged tooth or crooked smile. These tooth-shaped caps help restore your teeth and confidence. Some of us will need a dental crown or two in our lifetime and when this happens we’ll have plenty of questions. We hope this brief guide will help you understand the various kinds of dental crowns available and the costs.

Let’s begin with the primary question.

How Do I know I need A Dental Crown? 

Generally, there are a number of the common causes for getting a dental crown, they are:

1. To repair a weak or decayed tooth 

 2. To revive an already broken tooth or a tooth that has been severely worn down

3. To hide and support a tooth with an oversized filling when there's not a lot of tooth left

4. To carry a dental bridge in situ

5. To hide crooked or severely discolored teeth

6. To hide an implant

7. To create a cosmetic modification

Dental Crown Balwyn

What Does Getting a Dental Crown Involve?

 In most cases, if you would like a custom-made dental crown, you need to be prepared to go to your dentist a couple of times. It's not something a dentist can perform in just one appointment, unless you decide for a CEREC® crown, which allows you to place the crown in one visit. The process could also be different for every kind of dental crown. In general, getting a crown goes like this:

• Your dentist will prepare your tooth, which may involve the removal of decay, a root canal, or both.

• He or she takes a mold in order that the crown fits the precise shape of your tooth.

• A temporary restoration is fitted to guard the tooth until the crown is prepared. You must take special care of this temporary cap and avoid eating hard or sticky foods to protect it from cracking.

• After a couple of weeks, your dentist will have the crown ready.

Dental crowns Hawthorn

What style of Dental Crown Should I Choose? There are 5 Main Types 

  1. Gold crowns

 Gold is simply one of the best materials for restoring damaged teeth. It’s extremely durable and may last for several decades if properly maintained. It also causes minimal wear to adjacent teeth.  However gold restorations have diminished in popularity as more life- like materials are the choice of many. Most people are opting for porcelain specifically, a kind of fired ceramic glass that mimics the planning and color of teeth.

Dental Crown Deepdene

  Main ADVANTAGES of gold crowns:

• They are strong and highly resistant

• They last a long time if properly cared for

• Less proportion of your natural tooth has to be removed

• They wear quite slowly, similar to the natural enamel

• They are ideal for posterior restorations (back teeth), especially second molars

Main DISADVANTAGES of gold crowns:

• Poor aesthetics: They obviously don’t appear as a natural tooth

• Gold alloy crowns can affect some people and produce some side effects like swelling

Dental crowns Mont Albert

  1. All Porcelain Dental crowns

This is definitely the foremost popular variety of crown used nowadays. They're entirely made of porcelain material.

Dental crowns Camberwell

Some ADVANTAGES are:

• Porcelain or ceramic crowns provide the most effective and most natural look. They match your surrounding teeth in shape, size, and color.

• The most suitable choice for front teeth restorations.

• They are bio compatible: which means no metal is used, ensuring they are toxic-free.

However, the DISADVANTAGES of porcelain crowns are:

• They aren't as strong as metal crowns. Porcelain crowns can last a protracted time, but they need to be taken care of.

• Patients that suffer from bruxism should go for gold or Porcelain Fused-to-Metal Crowns PFM

• They could also be more costly than other sorts of crowns, like metal crowns.

  1. Porcelain Fused-to-Metal Crowns (PFM)

 Porcelain fused-to-metal (PFM) crowns are another widely used sort of dental crowns. They are both very strong and aesthetically pleasing. 

The main ADVANTAGES of PFM crowns are:

• They provide great aesthetics and sturdiness

• They’ve been around for over 50 years. We know they work well.

• They are more cost effective than porcelain crowns

However, the DISADVANTAGES of PFMs include:

• The metal in these crowns may cause a gray line at the gumline. this could not give the 100% aesthetic look that porcelain crowns provide.

• For those who clench their teeth, this kind of crown may grind more easily against the opposing teeth.

Dental crowns Kew

  1. Zirconia Crowns

Zirconium may be a relatively new material that mixes the strength of metal with the aesthetics of porcelain crowns. High translucent zirconia and layered zirconia crowns  have became a more popular choice lately.

The main ADVANTAGES of zirconia crowns are:

• They provide great aesthetics

• They are strong and long-lasting making them less likely to chip or break.

• The process may be less time consuming because zirconia are often cut and shaped at the dental office. There’s no need to send them over to a dental lab. 

 • They are biocompatible: as metal free crowns, they're unlikely to cause hypersensitive reactions.

The main DISADVANTAGES of Zirconia Crowns include:

• Their strength can make the teeth they bite against grate easily. • Solid Zirconia are often difficult to alter

  1. E- MAX: Lithium Disilicate Crowns

The newest kind of crown in dentistry today is the E -Max. It's a kind of all-ceramic crown manufactured from lithium disilicate (which is additionally light and thin).

The main ADVANTAGES of E-max crowns are:

• Great aesthetics. They look great in your mouth.

• They are durable and really strong.

• They provide a good choice both front and back teeth.

The main DISADVANTAGES of E-Max Crowns include:

• They can be dearer, especially to the dentist (who may or might not transfer that cost to you)

• Some dental professionals have reported failures using E-Max for posterior teeth, especially when doing multiple units. 

Dental crowns Surrey Hills

What is the price of Dental Crowns?

Now that you just have a better understanding of the various options for dental crowns, lets discuss the price of the various varieties of crowns. Ordinarily, all porcelain crowns are normally more costly than metal ones.  Generally speaking, crowns can range from $500 to $2000, or more. The range depends on whether or not you have insurance, what your policy actually covers, the dental fees charged by your dentist and the possible added procedures needed to complete treatment. To get an approximate,  you may spend between $400-600 for an indirect resin crown (a budget-friendly low term solution), which is essentially a restoration that's not made in a lab, but by your own dentist. Consider it as an oversized filling made in your dentist’s lab. The pros of this procedure are lower cost and less time in the chair (usually one visit). The cons are durability.  But it's not meant to last years and years like crowns do.

So what's the typical Cost of a Dental Crown?

Bear in mind every practice is different and we suggest you call our clinic to verify but the general costs are as follows: 

• The cost of Gold crowns can range between $2000-$2,500

• All-porcelain crowns can range between $800-$3,000

• Porcelain-fused-to-metal crowns can cost $500-$1,500

• Zirconia Crowns and E-max crowns cost approximately the same as all- porcelain crowns.

 If you have insurance, about 40% of the crown may be covered. But everything will depend on the kind of insurance you have and your particular case.  As with most things in life, you shouldn’t make a healthcare decision based solely on cost. Our dentists are highly experienced and are happy to answer all your questions. A dental crown is a long-lasting restorative treatment, it should be considered more of an investment than expense. Choosing the cheapest dentist may result in poor quality treatments which, in turn, will mean extra money, longer and more discomfort in the future.

If you have any questions relating to dental crowns please call our clinic today on (03) 9817 7144.


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