A post in my front tooth

[Samir 09]

Hi.

My front tooth broke when I was a teenager and I had root canal treatment on it. Im 35 now and it has now broken again. My dentist says that it needs to be crowned, but a metal post needs to be placed in it first to hold things together. He wants to put a post in my front tooth!

Please give me some advice as to what my treatment options are available. How long will this post crown last?

[Dr Mohsen J. Esfahani]

Thank you for your question.

Where a lot of coronal tooth tissue is lost and a root remains behind, a post becomes necessary in order to keep the core attached to the root. Without a core and post it becomes very difficult to have a retentive crown for a retained root.

There are different types of posts such as cast metal as well as tooth coloured posts. I use tooth coloured posts because I believe there is less risk of root fracture with tooth coloured posts compared to metal posts.

Other than a post crown, you could opt to have extraction of the root and then have a denture/gap/bridge or an implant. A normal crown on average lasts 10 years but a post-crown may last less on average if there is very little tooth remaining.