Can a Broken Porcelain Crown Be Repaired?

One night you are chewing your food as normal, when all of a sudden you hear a sickening crack – you immediately know what it is – one of your porcelain crowns has cracked! A common question that dentists get asked is whether a cracked porcelain crown can be repaired. The answer to this question depends on many factors.

The first important thing to take into consideration is on which part of the mouth the cracked crown is situated. Is it on the rear molar teeth or is it closer to the front of the mouth? The closer to the front teeth the crown is the more likely that a competent repair can be made. By “competent” we mean that the repair will last for more than a year. Since the front teeth are used in the chewing process, unlike the rear teeth, there is less force applied to these teeth while eating.

A dentist should be able to repair a chip in one of these crowns fairly easily, and he should be able to do it without taking the tooth out if the chip is small enough. If the crack or chip is on a bigger scale then the chances are that the dentist will have to remove the crown and possibly send it away to the lab for a proper repair.

What about the back teeth?

While the back teeth can be repaired as well, the chances are that any such repair will break again soon after due to the high forces that the molars have to bear when chewing. For these crowns it is recommended that they be replaced by new crowns.

All is not lost however – if the crown is under a year old then it should be covered by the dentist’s guarantee, and it should be replaced for free in this case. Not all dentists offer a guarantee on crowns, but if yours does not then perhaps it is time to change to a dentist that does.