How To Hasten Healing After Dental Implant Surgery

Dental implants look, feel, and act like your natural teeth. They are an excellent option for those who have missing teeth or problems with chewing. Prior to your procedure, your dental implant dentistry professional will talk to you about what to expect during and after your procedure so that you know what to expect every step of the way. Here are some suggestions he or she may recommend that will help hasten your recovery after your dental implant surgery.

Avoid The Wrong Foods

While you are recovering from your implant surgery, you will need to avoid hard foods, especially during the first couple of weeks following your procedure. During this time, your gums are still sensitive, and the titanium rods have not yet completed the fusion process to your jawbone. Your dentist will recommend that you eat soft foods such as soups, yogurt, flavored gelatin, rice, pureed fruits, and nutritious smoothies. Make sure that the soft foods you are eating are nutrient-dense.

Examples of nutrient-dense foods are avocados, kale, and quinoa. Avoiding hard, crunchy, or sticky foods will help promote healing of your gum tissue, lower your risk for implant failure, and reduce your risk of infection. Eating hard or crunchy foods can cause small cuts to develop in your gum tissue, which can allow infection-causing bacteria to invade your bloodstream. 

Get Adequate Rest

One of the most important healing suggestions your dentist may recommend to help hasten your recovery after dental implant surgery is to get enough rest. When you overexert yourself or don't get enough sleep, your body produces stress hormones that can interfere with proper circulation and healing.

Failure to get enough sleep and rest may also lower your immunity, which may put you at risk for infections at the surgical sites inside your mouth. Another reason why you should rest is so that the protective blood clots that have formed over your surgical sites are not disturbed. These clots protect your implant sites from bacterial invasion and excessive bleeding. If a protective clot becomes dislodged, dry socket may develop, which may cause severe pain and raise your risk for implant failure.

To speed healing after your dental implant surgery, consider the above suggestions. Also, if you experience any abnormal symptoms such as extreme pain, heavy bleeding, excessive facial swelling, fever, or a bad taste in your mouth following your implant procedure, call your dentist as soon as possible.