Had a bone graft done 6 months after dental implant, Help!

[Rude]

Hello, great forum!

I lost my front upper tooth due to trauma (Knee to the face). Living in a border town and lacking funds to pay for price, I went to mexico to get an implant placed. Now I spoke to 3 dentists here in the states and they all said I had thin bone.

I got the implant placed with the promise from my doctor that in 4 months he would place the healing collar. 4 months later when doing the torque test he said the implant slightly moved, wait 2 more months, we both agreed that would be for the best. 2 months later, he takes an xray says he will complete the task but notices in the xray there is black shades, that I would possibly need a bone graft.

So I go for the collar to be placed, when he uncovers it. I notice he say not good, and he then proceeds to give me a bone graft. He takes pictures of the area and points I have loose threads on my implant. That about 50% is intingrated and the other 50% is outside of the bone. We will now wait 6 weeks to see if my body takes in enough bone to then finish the process (place healing collar, molds, etc) if not then remove the implant and start over.

I have never heard of this (doing a bone graft after the implant has been placed). What are my chances for this bone graft to be successful so my implant wont fail? Any suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated, I have attached a picture of how it looked before he did the bone graft.

 

[comfortdentist]

Several problems here
1. If you know the bone is thin then graft first
2. much of the implant is exposed
3. You went to mexico for health care

While it is possible to graft non-contaminated implants U don;t know the health of this one. I also question what graft material will be used.

 

[Rude]

Several problems here
1. If you know the bone is thin then graft first
2. much of the implant is exposed
3. You went to mexico for health care

While it is possible to graft non-contaminated implants U don;t know the health of this one. I also question what graft material will be used.

Thank you for your response. I agree there are a lot of problems and I made a major mistake getting health care in Mexico. What would your advice be for me? Go to another dentist and see if I should wait it out the 6 weeks? Request implant is removed?

 

[comfortdentist]

One of the problems in the USA is when a patient has a complication from overseas dentistry no one really wants to touch it for fear of getting sued. The rational being is that the person will have a loss as a result of treatment which by this times evolves much more time, money, and disfigurement than the patient ever imagined. So when patients are upset they like to sue. Since there is NO recourse against the overseas doctor (and they know it) the patients are much more likely to sue the doctor with liability insurance (deep pocket).
It may not be the right thing but it is true.
The big problem now is what to do. I haven't done an examination of you so I can only speak in general terms.
In general there are 2 basic options.
1. Continue with care as planned. I would check on their sterilization protocol. I would especially want to know if there is regular third party monitoring of their sterilizing autoclave.
2. Have a local doctor reevaluate the case and treat.
The problem with treating an implant that is failing from the start is that many times they are never "right".
The other problem is when you remove a failing implant from a site that wasn't good to begin with is now that site is especially bad. These cases then become much more difficult to plan and reconstruct. Most dentists can not handle these cases. I would guess that at this point there might be 4 options to reconstruct assuming failure of current implant.
1. Block bone graft.
2. Bone morphorgenic protein enhanced bone graft.
3. Stem cell enhanced bone graft
4. Block bone graft.
5. Orthodontically move the adjacent tooth into the site.