Dr. Hahn is a very personable elderly dentist who I was referred to by someone I knew. He seemed very nice to work with, and after my teeth were extracted, he placed a set of "immediate" dentures as a bandage & to allow me to continue to function in my workplace. The fit and comfort of the denture against my gum tissue was good. The cost was around $2,500.00, to include some post-operation follow-up care.
The problem was with the look, fit, and finish of the dentures in all other respects. For starters, the dentures looked like "bubba teeth" that were bought in a novelty shop. The materials were visibly inexpensive and unrealistic.
On the lower plate, the denture bases were grossly uneven, which pushed my tongue out of center, causing me to be unable to speak clearly. The tooth placement and upper front gumline was pushed out more than a 1/8 of an inch, creating such a severe offset between the front of the denture base and the front of the teeth that my upper lip fell into a gap and essentially disappeared.
Also, the setting of the teeth in the denture bases was so deep, that my smile looked like it was buried inside the gumline. From a functional standpoint, the non-contact areas of the denture base were so badly sculpted and polished that the were catching on my tongue and food.instead of my tongue gliding over a smoothly finished acrylic denture base, it was catching on exposed edges of plastic. Of course, this meant that my dentures would pop out whenever I spoke or ate.
When I mentioned these things to Dr. Hahn, he just laughed. He told me, essentially, that's all the better things are with dentures. I was unwilling to accept this explanation and decided to put my money at risk. They were my dentures. I'd paid for them. So I went to work researching and improving the situation.
In order to restore my normal speech, I spend over 40 hours of my own time painstakingly resculpting the non-contact areas of the denture bases (i. E the top of the lower plate and the bottom of the upper plate). Then, I had to purchase expensive abrasives to restore the polish and gloss to the materials after they were resculpted.
I worked to ensure that there was reasonable symmetry between the left and right wall thicknesses. I eliminated jagged edges and places where the denture base did not curve smoothly down towards the contact areas that seated against my gums.
When I was done, my speech was normal, my plates did not pop out, and the cosmetic distortion of my lower jaw was eliminated. I was not able to eliminate the cosmetic distortion of my face around the upper plate, because there was insufficient denture base material to resculpt.
This proved to my satisfaction that it was completely possible for the dentures to have been delivered in that condition from the beginning. I mean, if I could struggle through and do it myself, as a total amateur, then a professional should have been able to do it in a matter of minutes.
Recently, the healing of my gums and reforming of the underlying bone has reached a point where I needed a "hard reline". I was told that this was NOT included in the follow-up care. I would be paying $700.00 additional in order to get these ugly dentures rebased. What that would mean is that I would have invested $3,200.00 in a set of "bubba teeth".
I have since discovered that it is completely possible to get these types of inexpensive dentures with this degree of fit and finish for around $960 from multiple sources, including direct internet businesses. For $2,500.00, I should have received "cosmetic dentures" of the highest quality and with the most realistic possible fit and finish. I should not have received "bubba teeth" that look like I bought them at Wal-Mart.
Dr. Hahn is a nice person. He supports local charities and is good to his friends. However, I would not recommend that you purchase dentures from him.
His lab uses the lowest common denominator of industry standard materials. Their fit against the gums will be very good. They will be functional. However, the exposed fit and finish of the denture bases will be terrible. Their cosmetic value will be zero. And the uneven thicknesses of the materials may push your tongue so far out of its normal symmetry that you may be unable to speak clearly.
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