Warfarin and dental implants.

[Tickertalker]

I'm considering investing in a couple of dental implants and have been told I will need bone replacement. Just wondering if anyone has done this while on Warfarin or is it a bad idea?

[DoggieMum]

I'm not on Warfarin but I do take blood thinners and have had to have teeth out. I have to stop taking my tablets for 2 days beforehand. I think you need to get advice from your health care professional before undertaking this treatment. Good luck

[Hidden]

Dear Tickertalker,

I have had extensive dental work done, but was advised to stop the blood thinners I was on during it. { with the ok from my Cardiologist }

I did not have any bone grafts, so I would contact the dental implant surgery team and ask what they need in preparation , then contact your Dr/Cardiologist team with the proposals set by them.

They may except a ' lighter ' blood thinner during the procedure , better that your dental surgeon talks to your heart team direct.

You will be surprised what they can do now, it will also depend on if you have full anesthesia and what is the likelihood of infection, which can be a very serious problem for your new valve.

There maybe other alternatives to having implants but that is a discussion for you to have with your dental team.

Please don't think of having them done abroad because of the specialist care you need.

Take care and keep us informed please, your experience could help many others.

[Wingnutty]

I've not had implants done and I was strongly advised not to get them done by a senior dentist. Following his advice, I googled problems with dental implants and it appears that most of what the dentist advised was correct. Infections are common and you might end up on antibiotics for the rest of your life to fight those infections. Please google this before making a decision to go ahead. Something else we found when my wife's auntie died and we were dealing with her estate, is that she had a few implants which we didn't know about. All of here direct debits were cancelled when her bank account ,was closed, but we got in touch with the individual companies involved anyway because for a while we had to take over utility bills and such like until we sold her house. One of the direct debits we found was for an insurance company for work on dental implants. I can't remember the exact amount, but she was paying around 30 quid a month for this insurance which would pay out if she needed very expensive treatment on her implants. And that was in 2020. Bear in mind that dental infections are the last thing you want if you have heart problems. Many on here have told us about this.