The term crown describes the portion of your tooth that extends above the gumline - in other words, the portion of the tooth that can be seen in a healthy mouth.
It is also used more colloquially to describe the dental procedure of having a prosthetic crown placed over a decayed, chipped, cracked, or otherwise damaged tooth.
With this dental procedure code, the prosthetic crown placed over your tooth is constructed of composite resin, and completely covers the entire remaining portion of the tooth.
Synthetic resins are liquid materials that can be converted into a permanent hardened material, and in dentistry are most commonly acrylic polymer or polymethyl methacrylate. Because of their tooth-colored appearance, resin crowns can be used on teeth within the smile-zone, and come in a variety of shapes and sizes that the dentist will experiment during the crown placement procedure.
Unlike custom-made crowns, a pre-fabricated resin crown is pre-made by a firm that specializes in providing this type of restorative dental product to dentists.
For adults, they are primarily used as temporary crowns until budget or time permits the installation of a more permanent solution, such as a 3/4 porcelain/ceramic crown or a porcelain fused to noble metal crown.
To prepare for this type of crown, a dentist will first remove any decayed or weakened areas of the tooth, and reduce its overall shape to accommodate the crown.
The dentist will then test the different sized crowns on your teeth until the correct size is found. Further adjustments may then be made to the crown itself in order to achieve a secure fit.
Once the dentist is satisfied with the fit of the crown, and your bite, the crown will be cemented in place.
To look up and find more CDT dental codes from the American Dental Association, please visit our complete Dental Procedure Code Library.