The 13th February meeting saw club member and dentist John O’Neill providing another bite! at the intricacies of dentistry. When he last spoke John provided a comprehensive look at various ways to ‘fill the gap’ – and all in somewhat queasy full colour!

Although not a service that John provides himself, he chose this time to speak about the ‘Rolls Royce’ gap filler – beautifully engineered implants. These are made from precious metals and designed to be screwed into the jaw and with the tooth support and tooth then fitted to it. But at a Rolls Royce price of around £2,000 per implant.

Although expensive and a very specialized form of dental surgery, John explained that these can provide a cosmetically attractive as well as a functional solution when all else fails. In skilled hands implants are now reliable with success rates of 98% after 10 years achieved. At this point we were firmly reminded that, as always, good oral hygiene is important to the achievement of these high success rates – a statement that had some in the audience shifting uneasily in their chairs!  

We heard how the alveolar bone shrinks when teeth are lost and that it is this which is often a root! cause of the challenges a dentist can face. However modern dental surgery can enable bone to be rebuilt with material from chin, hip – or even bovine or equine sources.

As well as providing a foundation for the replacement of individual teeth implants are now also being used to provide a firm foundation for the attachment of both upper and lower dentures – more secure and avoiding the masking of taste buds.

Altogether another fascinating insight to what modern dentistry can achieve – and again a powerful reminder to keep flossing!

Following many questions a somewhat relieved vote of thanks was proposed by David Partington.