ACE Surgical Mini Dental Implant with a Zest Locator for the Upper Denture Plate
Does your upper denture gag you? Does it feel like a big bulky piece of plastic? Do you not taste your food anymore? Do you talk funny or don't sound like yourself anymore?
These are all the things my patient told me yes to. That is a lot of yes answers to have on one patient. Usually I don't get that many issues with the upper denture. But when we do have someone that just simply can not wear the upper full denture plate its a huge problem; both for function and esthetics.
Upper denture prior to placing 4 Mini Dental Implants with a Zest Locator attachment (different than a o-ball and ring snap typically used on mini dental implants).
Zest Locator attachment. It has a flat surface to make inserting the snap easier on the patient than the o-ball and ring. It also has different nylon rings that can be swapped out by the dentist to offer the patient levels of retention…..so if the denture is not tight enough a more retentive ring can be placed. This feature is not available on the o-ball mini dental implant.
4 ACE Surgical Secure Mini Dental Implants with Locator attachments.
Upper denture marked for location of the ACE Secure Mini Dental Implant.
Space created for the Zest Locator 'snaps' that will be fitted inside the existing upper denture. In a few weeks I will make the upper denture into a horseshoe shape so he can: 'Talk better, taste his food better and gag much less'
Snaps picked up in the upper denture. These rings will be replaced with more retentive rings after the implants heal into the bone. But even today the denture is tight and my patient is impressed with how much hold he has now.
Final Pan X-ray of the ACE Surgical Mini Dental Implants with a Zest Locator Attachment.
In the end I am impressed with the Locator attachment. A bit more skill required to place these mini dental implants than a o-ball type. This is mostly due to the protocol of using a 2.3mm in the front and having to place a 3.25mm in the back. My preference would have been to just use 6 2.3mm minis and give the patient a few extra implants. But as with any product it is up to the dentist to determine what he/she feels is best for the patient. This case could have been done and been successful with any mini dental implant, IMTEC MDI, Intra-Lock, OCO Biomedical mini or micro.
Paresh B Patel DDS Dentist Mooresville NC