5 Facial Changes You Can Avoid By Replacing a Lost Tooth with an Implant

Most people only worry about how their appearance will change when a front tooth is lost – after all, these are the most visible teeth in your mouth. However, even missing teeth towards the back of your mouth can impact the appearance of your face, but you can prevent those changes from occurring by having the tooth replaced with a dental implant.

Here are just five changes to your face's appearance that can be prevented by fitting dental implants.

1. Hollow Cheeks

While front teeth provide support for the facial muscles in your lips and cheeks, teeth towards the back maintain your jawline and prevent the cheeks from caving inwards. When one or more teeth are lost, muscle ligaments weaken and facial tissue can begin to sag. This is usually seen most clearly around the cheeks, which tend to take on a loose and hollow appearance.

2. Shrinking Jawline

When one of your teeth is lost, the jawbone beneath will start to be reabsorbed. This essentially means your jawbone will be shrinking, and this can make your face appear pinched and shorter than it should. In some cases, a shrinking jawbone can also cause the bone to rotate forwards. Dental implants are particularly good at preventing such issues since they place the same pressure on your jawbone as natural teeth. This ensures the bone isn't reabsorbed.

3. Wrinkles

When teeth are lost, the muscles around your lips can start to atrophy and the upper lip can become more pronounced. This can cause more wrinkles than normal, especially around the edges of the mouth. Additionally, changes in the angles of your face can increase the appearance of those lines, making you appear much older than you actually are.

4. Thinning Lips

Tooth loss can cause the upper lip to become more pronounced, but it can also cause both lips to appear thin. This is because teeth will no longer support your lips. The weakening of facial muscles also plays a role in the appearance of thinning lips since they can make the lips appear longer rather than fuller.

5. Misaligned Teeth

Finally, it's worth considering how missing teeth will affect your remaining teeth. Teeth provide support for each other, so losing even one or two can mean they start to shift around and become misaligned. As well as leading to crooked or crowded teeth, this can give your face a slightly lopsided look, especially if teeth are lost on only one side.

To learn more about dental implants, reach out to a local cosmetic dentist.