I had a few crowns fitted at the local dental school many years ago. They are great and have given me no trouble. Theyare almost as good as the original teeth through I have to be careful when biting apples. The only tip I can give you is to use interdental brushes to clean them.

I have several and had my first implant last year. The crowns have generally held up well an I never had special instructions on cleaning them like our laddie up there did. They are expensive – that’s for sure but the implant was worse. One root canal which wasn’t as painful as I feared.

I honestly haven’t gone to the dentist in about 16 years.
I brush twice a day, floss every other and don’t really have any trouble.
I do have really old, metal fillings on the bottom back teeth and I wanna get those fillings replaced with whatever safer option is available now.
I have no idea how they do that or what it costs.
Also I have some crowding so I wanna hit the orthodontist too and get that straightened out, but I have no coverage.
I might have to take out a bank loan to get my teeth tuned up. : (

I haven’t been to a dentist since I was a very small child.

I would, legit, need to hit the lottery to be able to afford the work I need.

My teeth are embarrassing.

Wow, @Seek, you could be endangering your health by not seeing a dentist. Really. I’m serious. There are places in most communities where you could be treated for free. They may not be available all the time. You just have to “seek” them out.

I probably am, but I honestly wouldn’t know where to start. And I’m kinda afraid if I let someone touch it things would only get worse.

Seek: From my experience free clinics have one solution. And that is pull the tooth. They don’t even fill a cavity, they just pull, pull, pull so you get out fast.

And I am willing to bet the net is more robust here than it is there.

In the early 2000s I developed a crack in a tooth. The tooth did not split apart because the gum held it together, but sometimes when I put pressure on the tooth the two halves would be forced apart by a fraction of a millimeter, causing intense pain. The episodes gradually got more frequent and painful, so I had a gold crown put on.

Fast forward to 2013. Another tooth began to develop a similar problem, and a dentist in my city wanted over $1000 to take care of it. I put it off and went on a trip to Poland. While there, I found out that dental tourism is a big deal in Poland. They do cutting-edge dentistry and the prices are lower than in the US or UK. I had the tooth looked at. They told me they could just clean out the old amalgam filling and put in a new ceramic filling that would hold the tooth together with no need for a metal crown, and it would look more like a natural tooth. The total cost for the initial exam, x-rays, and subsequent procedure cost much less than the cost or getting a crown in the US. So I got it taken care of there.

I have implants and I love them. Two of them I got around 1995/1996 and one I got around 10 years ago. Miracle teeth – they don’t rot, you can eat what you want and they don’t come out at night, and no unsightly wires. Crowns – of the three implants, two were done at Columbia Dental School in NYC (the two from 1995/1996) and the crowns were done there too. The third implant was done at a periodontist and the crown was done at a specialist’s office. Most recently, one of the early crowns failed (after 20 years) and I had it replaced at the specialist’s office. He made a temporary crown to get me through the weeks it took to make the real one. I paid for the temp but it prevented my other teeth from shifting around.

I always recommend implants to people who need to have teeth replaced.

I have a crown that was put in a few years ago. No root canal was done, it was just that too many pieces of my tooth were cracking off (on the sides). I have had trouble with pain when eating on it since the near beginning.

I had gone to a Medicaid dentist and he sucked. The Medicaid dentist I go to now is much better. He’s done X-rays and has found no decay underneath. I think it’s the way the crown was put on. Not an easy thing to get Medicaid to approve for a new crown. Maybe I should push it, I dunno.

I had a bridge made last month – 2 front teeth and 3 molars.I bit on putty. I do not have insurance. Around $800 OOP. I got a discount for paying up front. Old school, all the way. Young dentist working in a town of 1,300 in the rural Midwest.

I’m 66 and have had a lot of dental work done in my mouth. I’ve had only one really bad dentist. Most were good and a couple excellent ones.

I’ve had several extraction when I was young so there was plenty of room for my wisdom teeth to come in. Today I have all 4 of my wisdom teeth and 3 of them have crowns. About half of my teeth have crowns (3 gold). Also I have quit a few “silver” fillings.

Over the years I’ve had 3 periodontal surgeries (not including a sub gingival curettage next week), a few root canal procedures, a bone graft on my jaw and one tooth implant.

For decades I’ve flossed several times a day, brushed after most meals and use antimicrobial mouth wash at night. Nevertheless my gums are starting to develop some slight periodontal disease. So I’ve recently stepped up my dental hygiene routine. Twice a day I use a Philips “Sonicare” AND an Oral-B “Professional Care 2000”. Apparently what I was doing wasn’t effective anymore.

I’m so grateful and thankful to dentists. It’s so important to have a healthy mouth in order to maintain good general health.

It’s nice to have teeth too! I’m willing to work hard and pay a lot of money to have teeth.