PRINCIPLES OF REMOVABLE DENTURE THERAPY

Abstract

An important field of gerontology is the determination of a person’s biological age, in order to assess the changes produced in the body as time elapses. A considerable amount of research work conducted in this direction has proven that the morphological, physiological, biochemical, psychological and social involution changes are not identical in individuals of the same age, as such, the biological age does not usually correspond to the chronological, calendar age. Each individual has his/her own rate of aging, which follows more or less the physiological development of the senescence process. One of the most important categories of patients who go to the dentist today is the elderly. They usually present with a complex pathology due to the loss of a large number of dental units (very often subtotal edentulism), due to complications that have occurred over time and, last but not least, due to the pathophysiological specificity of this category of patients. The pathological conditions caused by the significant changes underwent by the dento-maxillary system functions may trigger severe homeostasis impairment in the remaining alveolar bone, in the oral mucosa, of the temporo-mandibular joint, of the masticatory and perioral muscles, as well as of the nervous system of the edentulous patient. Edentulism is an abnormal clinical condition in which the morphological and functional alteration processes were triggered long before, i.e. at the time of onset of the diseases that determined it.