Cercon crown

[Ruby]

Hi

My front crown recently became loose and my dentist told me that I need a new crown as the old crown no longer fits very well. He cemented the crown back in for now with a temporary glue and I am due to go back to see him for a new crown. The current crown is over 20 years old and I knew that it needed to be replaced sooner or later, so the news was not a big suprise to me.

My dentist has recommended a cercon crown as a replacement for my current crown and says he mainly does cercon crowns on front teeth these days. I would like to know what's the difference between cercon crowns and my current white crown? Are Cercon crowns stronger than my white crown and do they look better than my current crown?

[Dr Mohsen J. Esfahani]

Thank you for your post. I assume that you may have the old metal ceramic crown and your dentist has recommended the Cercon crown as a replacement.

Cercon crowns have a white Zirconium core which is not quite as strong as metal ceramic core but not a lot weaker. But the advantage of the Cercon core is that its white in colour similar in shade to tooth colour, whereas the metal ceramic core is grey and so the grey colour needs to be hidden with the porcelain bonded on top of it.

I find that Cercon crowns look more natural than metal ceramic crowns and I tend to prefer to use them for front teeth crowns.