Not all dentures are created equal. The materials used can dramatically affect the life, fit, comfort, esthetics, as well as the overall function of your dentures. One of the biggest advantages of choosing a Denturist to make your dentures is that they will not only do the clinical appointments involved with making your dentures, they will also make your dentures physically on site. As a result of this, great care will be given in choosing materials specifically for you and your budget. Most denture clinics will offer both economy as well as premium dentures. The materials in both dramatically affect the quality of the denture. In this blog, I will talk about what I believe to be one of the most important materials involved with denture fit. This is the denture acrylic itself ( pink portion of the denture ) and the process in which it is made.
Conventional acrylic vs SR Ivocap injection molded acrylic:
Acrylics have been used to make dentures for many years. Traditionally most dentures had been made using conventional heat cure acrylics. This is done by mixing a powder ( polymer ) with a liquid ( monomer ) the material becomes doughy and is placed under pressure and heat, to cure the acrylic resin. As this process takes place the acrylic shrinks and warps slightly. This in turn causes the acrylic to not fully adapt to the model that is being made to fit too. A good conventional acrylic usually adapts to somewhere around a 90-95 percent accuracy. Some conventional acrylics can be even less accurate than that. This is a major concern when you are trying to get the best fit possible for your patient.
The SR Ivocap is an injection-molded acrylic system. This means that rather than the Denturist manually applying the acrylic dough to the mold under pressure. Acrylic is automatically injected into the mold. This allows for the acrylic molecules to be packed tighter together making the acrylic base stronger. As the material is injected and shrinks more material is constantly injected during the curing process allowing for almost complete adaptation to the model and ultimately a better fit. I have incorporated the ivocap system into our practice about 12 years ago and have found the results to be phenomenal. The result has been better fitting dentures and happy patients. For more information contact our office. In part 2 of this blog, I will discuss the different types of denture teeth available to be used for dentures.