How Long Does a Bone Graft Take to Heal?
Dentists perform the dental bone grafting procedure before dental implant placement surgery if they think the jawbone lacks the sufficient density to hold the implanted titanium post in place. The process occurs before you undergo dental implant surgery because your mouth’s chewing exerts excessive pressure on the bone. If your jawbone cannot support the implant surgical procedure will likely fail.
What Is the Recovery Time Associated with Bone Grafting?
Before determining the time to recover from bone grafting, it is essential to understand what happens before the surgical procedure.
When you lose a tooth or two, the bone beneath starts losing its density, especially if you don’t replace the missing tooth as soon as possible because the stimulation the bone received from the chewing forces is no longer present. However, if you receive a dental implant soon after missing a tooth, the bone beneath remains stable, enabling the dentist to perform implant placement surgery without needing the patient to undergo a bone graft.
Bone grafting procedures are standard before dental implant placement because many patients desiring dental implants do not have a dense bone to support them. Fortunately, bone grafting is unnecessary if the dentist thinks your jawbone is thick enough to support the implant.
Requirements for Bone Grafting
Most people think bone grafting requires the dentist to extract bone from one part of the mouth to augment it in the other, where dental implant placement is planned. However, the process doesn’t rely on human bone alone and is performed using alternative materials. The materials for bone grafting used by dentists include human, animal, and synthetic bone. However, dentists ensure all materials are safe except for human bone taken from your mouth.
Is Bone Grafting Painful?
You might think any surgical procedure will cause immense pain when the dentist works in your mouth. However, little or no pain is associated with bone grafting procedures because you receive sedation and local anesthesia in the mouth. In addition, you will experience swelling in your cheeks after the procedure. However, the discomfort is minimal because the dentist provides painkillers to alleviate your pain.
What Happens After Bone Grafting?
After your bone grafting procedure, you receive antibiotics to prevent infections. In addition, the dentist prescribes pain relievers if you complain about discomfort. However, as long as you take the antibiotics prescribed, you don’t confront challenges.
How Lengthy Is the Recovery Period?
Various factors, including the surgical process, determine how long you need to recover from bone grafting. Your age and physical and general health also play a role in your recovery. However, complete healing from the bone grafting procedure is generally a couple of weeks to over two months.
If you are planning dental implant surgery, you must wait until the bone graft has fused with your jawbone. The fusing requires a few months, and dentists suggest you come in for regular checkups to ensure they can monitor the healing of the bone graft.
After-Care for Bone Grafting
You must take the pain medications suggested by the dentist within a couple of hours after your procedure. After the initial dose, you must continue using the medicine regularly for at least 72 hours. If the dentist prescribes antibiotics, they help prevent infections making it essential for you to complete the entire course without skipping doses.
You can expect some bleeding to occur during the initial 48 hours. To control the bleeding, place a gauze pad over the surgical area and bite it for about 30 minutes. If you experience swelling, you can use an ice pack on your cheeks for 15-minute intervals during the initial 48 hours. You can also minimize swelling by eating ice cream and ice cubes or having cold drinks.
While maintaining dental hygiene, you must refrain from flossing or brushing the surgical site and practice gentle brushing around the surrounding teeth. You must follow the instructions of the dentist in Beverly Hills until the area has recovered to start brushing and flossing normally. Starting the day after the surgery, you must rinse the surgical site thrice daily. However, using the mouth rinse suggested by the dentist or warm salt water is beneficial instead of alcohol-based mouthwash brands. You must also refrain from gargling or rinsing vigorously.
Restricting physical activity is suggested by dentists after bone grafting surgery, besides smoking which can impair your healing.
Swelling, discomfort, and bruising are expected after bone grafting surgery. However, contacting the dentist is recommended if you experience fever, severe pain, bleeding that doesn’t subside, allergic reactions to medications, and warm swelling in the area after the procedure.
Bone grafting is beneficial to help augment bone for various dental procedures. However, you must ensure you heal correctly by following the specific instructions of your dentist to prevent aggravating the area.
Implant Dentistry by Doc Rok performs many bone grafting surgical procedures on patients needing dental implants to replace missing teeth. Consult them if you need dental implants but need an adequate jawbone to support them for the process.