When is a crown necessary?

A dental crown is a prosthetic replacement used to replace lost tooth structure. It is often necessary and ideal for situations where there is extensive destruction of tooth structure. Such extensive destruction or loss of tooth structure can be caused either through fractures or decay.

However, according to Dr. Mark Cruz, this is an era where dental crowns are often chosen in place of more conservative approaches to the same problem. By opting to get crowns, patients are often at risk since proper crown preparations and placement require extensive removal of tooth structure which may be highly unnecessary if a more conservative approach was followed.

A dental crown-based treatment process starts with a laboratory procedure. An impression of the affected tooth is taken and sent to the lab for preparation. Once received by the dental office, the patient is called and the lab-prepared dental crown is placed and cemented onto the affected tooth. For the structurally weak tooth, proper form and function are restored.

In order to ensure a proper fit for the crown over an affected tooth, the preparation and design stages entail the adherence to specific criteria. These criteria include a sufficient amount of tooth structure for the crown to be retained and resist displacement while chewing and eating. While the former criterion is known as retention form, the latter is referred to as resistance form. Without fulfilling these criteria, a dental crown will not provide the desired results.