Flase Teeth in The Modern World

Flase Teeth in The Modern World

Dentures or false teeth, have been one of the most widely impacting medical and cosmetic inventions in human history. Medically, dentures allow a person with several, or even all of their teeth missing, to chew and eat food they otherwise would not be able to. Cosmetically, dentures allow a person with severe tooth decay or missing teeth, to present a fresh new cheerful smile, irrespective.

Dentures come in two main kinds, removable partial dentures and complete or whole dentures.

As far back as 700BC humanity has been using dentures on a regular basis. Originating in Northern Italy, this type of denture would use animal or human teeth, strung together and simply tucked into the mouth at mealtimes.

These early dentures were not especially comfy and due to the technology level at the time, their construction was not very robust. Due to the fact that this type of early denture was often fabricated from real human teeth, several primitive practices evolved around the industry of their manufacture.

During this period, soldiers would often carry pliers, in the hope of extracting good teeth from their vanquished foes, to resell after a battle. Several undertakers in France, during the 14th century, were accused of taking the teeth of bodies they had examined, and selling them on to denture manufacturers. Despite these the profound downsides, early dentures using teeth from dead humans or animals remained popular until the mid-19th century.

The first dentures which took a recognizable form compared to modern dentures were fabricated in Japan during the 15th century. These were constructed from a hard wood, usually Buxus Microphylla, and were shaped very much like modern dentures; they even relied upon suction to keep them in place.

London, England was the melting pot (quite literally at times due to the fact that moulded gold was often used when manufacturing dentures) which produced the finest dentures during the 16th century. Certain gentlemen, most notably barbers, goldsmiths and ivory workers, began to produce Gentlemen s Teeth . These were lavish dentures crafted from gold, ivory and occasionally diamond. Intended as much as a social symbol as they were a tool to aid in eating! Cosmetic dentures had arrived.



In 1770, Alexis Duch teau began experimenting with different compounds from which to mass produce hard wearing false teeth. Finally he settled upon porcelain as the ideal cheap solution.

In 1791, Nicholas Dubois De Chemant, who had been an assistant of Alexis Duch teau, was granted the first UK patent for porcelain teeth.One of the major benefits of beginning to use porcelain for the manufacture of false teeth was the fact that it could also be coloured to match any remaining teeth the wearer still had. Although these porcelain teeth were a great advancement for denture wearers, the actual way in which the teeth were clipped or wired into the jaw was far from perfect.

In 1754, one man did more for making dentures common than any man had done before. George Washington commissioned an unknown ivory worker to make him a set of dentures. George Washington's dentures were the most advanced of their kind ever made at the time, and were fabricated from several types of ivory, including walrus, elephant and hippopotamus, as well as real teeth of human, pony and horse origin.

It was not until the 1850s that Claudius Ash quite literally worked the dentures we see today. By setting porcelain teeth in to a special kind of hard rubber named Vulcanite.
Vulcanite dentures used suction to keep them in place within the mouth, as most dentures still do nowadays.

Nothing major changed in the way dentures are constructed between the 1850s and present day. Vulcanite was replaced by several substances but the overall concept stayed the same.

Firstly, acrylic resin replaced Vulcanite, a much softer yet hardwearing material, making dentures more comfortable to wear. Acrylic resin had one particular defect. How many readers remember their grandparents cursing as they cracked or split the plate of their denture tackling some hard food? Acrylic resin was prone to becoming fragile over time.

Eventually, up-to-date polymer based plastics replaced acrylic resin as the materiel of choice for denture manufacture. Hard wearing and lightweight, it remains in use today.

Increased oral hygiene has caused a large downturn in the use of dentures. Consider the UK alone. In 1968, a survey of the population aged between 65 and 75 years old, showed that 79% of them had no natural teeth of their own. A survey of the UK population between the ages of 65 and 75 years old taken in 1998 showed that only 36% of them suffered from total tooth loss.

Modern dentures are solid, comfortable and almost entirely discreet, most people you meet wearing modern dentures appear to have entirely healthy natural teeth.

So there we have a concise history of false teeth going back some 4500 years. Although a simple concept, dentures have enabled billions of people to live a normal life when faced with the fact the state of their natural teeth has declined significantly as they became older.

Philip McKeown is Scotlands own local Clinical Dental Technician. Firstly qualifying as a Dental Technician in Glasgow in 1980 and then achieving further post graduate qualifications in CLINICAL Dental Technology in Toronto and London, latterly with the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Philip provides Dentures in Scotland http://www.philipmckeown.com/