Once your dental implants have been finalised, it's as though your natural teeth are complete once again. But of course, the implants have been manually inserted into your jaw and finished with prosthetic teeth to create an exact replica of your natural teeth. But will the metal components of your implants ever create a problem in your daily life?
Physical Comfort
Dental implants are designed to be permanent. The actual implant (the bolt inserted into your jaw) is titanium, and this is the preferred material due to its hypoallergenic qualities. This means you will not experience any irritation or adverse reaction to the implant, which is quite handy, especially when you consider that an implant needs the very tissues in your jaw to fuse to it. Beyond that, avoiding any complications involves you diligently maintaining a high standard of oral health. But will having these metal components in your mouth pose any problems in some circumstances you might face?
Metal Detectors
Firstly, your implants are unlikely to set off a metal detector. So when you're at an airport or any venue that screens people via a metal detector, your implants are unlikely to trigger the detector. A metal detector works by sending pulses of electromagnetic energy into the target area, and these pulses bounce back to create a reply, which is a type of echo. When there is metal in the target area, this interrupts that reply, triggering the detector. However, your implants contain such a small amount of metal that the detector generally will not register a potential problem. Detectors have different settings, and so implants can conceivably be registered. If this occurs, security staff will usually conduct an additional check, using a handheld detector, which can flag the location and nature of the metal in your body.
Medical Scans
Another situation where metal in your body could cause a reaction is if you ever require magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). This type of medical scan involves you being placed inside what is basically a gigantic magnet, however, only metals classified as having ferromagnetic properties (metals that can actually be attracted by a magnet) will be affected. Your titanium implant is not ferromagnetic, so it will not harm you during an MRI, nor should it affect the quality of the scan. You should still inform both your doctor and MRI technician about the presence of your implants, just so that they can be aware of the location of any metal in your body.
Dental implants are not only designed to replace natural teeth, but they're also designed to avoid any potential daily complications from having metal present in your mouth.
