Prosthetic replacement for missing teeth.

Types of dentures

  • Complete or Full (F) - a denture that replaces all teeth for the arch (maxillary or mandibular). Actually this is not entirely accurate because nobody bothers putting wisdom teeth on dentures.
  • Partial (P) - A denture that replaces one or more teeth in the arch.
  • Common notation for indicating upper (maxillary) or lower (mandibular) dentures:

    F/- full upper denture only
    -/F full lower denture only
    F/F upper and lower denture
    Same with P/-, -/P and P/P
    F/P is definitely more common than P/F.

    F/P scenario is typically a full upper denture sitting on about 6 lower front natural teeth, and many times, without the -/P being worn. This is because your lower front teeth are usually the last teeth you will loose from decay.

    Materials for dentures
    Acrylic for the framework and teeth, or
    Acrylic for the teeth on a cobalt chromium (or even Type IV gold!) framework.
    And once upon a time they used porcelain teeth on acrylic. And even further back, they used vulcanite to make the denture bases.

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