How Much Do Dental Implants Cost?

What is A Dental Implant?

A dental implant is a surgical procedure which installs a small titanium post directly into your jaw bone to provide an anchor for an artificial tooth which will be emplaced later. This titanium post or implant, serves as the root of a tooth, and its function is to provide an anchor and foundation for the artificial tooth which will eventually get installed. Following the surgical implementation of the implant, it is left to fuse with your jaw bone, so that it actually becomes part of the jaw bone and part of your mouth.

How Expensive are Dental Implants compared to other Dental Procedures?

As dental procedures go, implants are among the most expensive, but they are also the most successful dental procedures in existence. The reason that implants are so expensive is that they have to cover the cost of the implant itself, an abutment which gets attached to the implant, and the crown which fits on to the abutment.

The total cost of a dental implant can be made even more expensive if any bone grafting is necessary. When there is inadequate jaw bone mass to support a dental implant, it becomes necessary to increase the bone mass in that area by sourcing it from somewhere else in the body. Below, we'll consider the cost of dental implants on a type by type basis, since there are several kinds of dental implants currently being used.

Although a dental implants cost can range anywhere from $500 to $8,000, the average cost of installing a single implant in the USA averages between $3,000 and $4,500.

The average cost will vary significantly from one location to the next, even within the same specific country. In some cases, it may be possible to lower the cost of implants, if you opt to have multiple implants installed at the same time. Whenever you see a suspiciously low cost for an advertised dental implant, make sure that the cost includes all three components, i.e. the implant itself, the abutment, and the crown.

There are several components which go into the overall total cost of an implant. The line items listed below are generally included in the cost, but sometimes others are not, so you may need to consider whether these additional line items are necessary in your personal treatment.

Initial Evaluation  :  $50 - $300

X-Ray of the Entire Mouth  :  $250

Cone Beam CT (CBCT)  :  $150 - $750

Tooth Extraction  :  $150 to $700

Simple Bone Grafting  :  $200 - $300

Complex Bone Grafting  :  $1000 - $1200

Specialized Bone Grafting  :  $2800 - $3200

Abutment  :  $300 - $600

Implant Crown  :  $900 to $1,500

Dental Implant  :  $1,500 to $3,000.

The above provided breakdown is for Dental Implants Cost in Charleston and nearby South Carolina Areas. Keep in mind that all these line item costs will themselves vary from one city to the next, depending on your geographic location in the country.

Standard dental implants are typically comprised of a titanium alloy, but you'll be allowed to choose the materials for your own dental crown. Most crowns are made of porcelain-fused-to-metal, layered zirconia, full dental gold, resin composites, or zirconia. Of these material choices, the ones which are most sturdy are full gold dental options, as well as zirconia. These will also typically last the longest, and that will be important because crowns will not last as long as the implants themselves. Implants can be expected to last a lifetime, but the crown or artificial tooth is exposed to daily wear and tear during chewing, and will typically last 10 to 20 years.

The average cost of a standard dental implant is between $3,000 and $4,500.

This is an exciting and relatively new dental procedure which makes it possible to replace all 14 of the teeth on your upper or lower arch with just four dental implants. This is extremely significant, since it would otherwise be necessary to install one implant per tooth in any replacement strategy. All-on-4 dental implants can either be removable implant-retained dentures, or they can be fixed in place dentures.

The big difference between these two is that fixed dental implants can only be taken out by a dentist, whereas removable dentures can and should be taken out each night so they can be cleaned. While the all-on-4 procedure may not be right for everyone, it's an excellent alternative if all of the teeth on an upper or lower arch must be replaced.

You can expect to have the best possible solution installed, since all-on-4s are completely reliable, and will last the rest of your life. The cost for removable dentures for all-on-4 implants varies between $8,000 and $17,500.

The cost for fixed dentures would be around $15,000 to $30,000 per arch.

These types of dental implants are generally used to stabilize a denture, or they are sometimes used as a temporary solution, with a more permanent one being planned. In any case, they're not intended for long-term coverage. Some situations call for the installation of a mini dental implant because there simply isn't enough mass in the jaw bone at a particular location to install a normally-sized standard implant. Whatever the reason, when it's necessary to install a mini implant, you can expect to pay between $500 and $1,000 per tooth.

This type of dental procedure involves installing the implant on the same day as either bone grafting or tooth extraction. This process is sometimes referred to as immediate loading of dental, immediate dental, or teeth-in-a-day. This is a considerable departure from the traditional approach to installing implants, and while research is lacking, it is thought to be less successful than standard implementation of an implant.

It is known that a number of other results have been achieved using same-day implants as opposed to conventional implants. This is to be expected, since conventional implants are usually only installed several months after teeth have been extracted, whereas same-day implants do both in one day.

You can expect the cost of same-day plans to raise the cost anywhere from $5,000 to $8,000 per tooth.