Honest advice · no judgement

Had dental treatment abroad?
Here's how to look after it.

Crowns in Turkey, implants in Hungary, veneers in Poland — thousands of people from the UK have treatment overseas every year. If you're one of them, this page is about what your new teeth need now. Not a lecture. A plan.

Let's get one thing out of the way first: we're not going to tell you off for going abroad. People go for real reasons — price, waiting lists, family nearby — and plenty of overseas work is done well. A patient recently asked us, almost apologetically, for "a price for cleaning a full mouth — I have full crowns and 8 implant screws from Turkey." That's exactly the right instinct, and nobody here blinked.

What matters now is simple: heavily restored teeth need more maintenance than natural ones, not less — and the practice that fitted them is 2,000 miles away.

Why crowns and implants need a local dentist

  • Gums don't care where the work was done. Crowns and implants can't decay, but the gum around them can still get infected — and around implants that infection (peri-implantitis) can quietly loosen the implant itself. It rarely hurts until it's advanced.
  • Margins collect plaque. The join where a crown meets the tooth is the highest-risk spot in your mouth. Professional cleaning reaches what brushing can't.
  • Small problems are cheap; late problems aren't. A loose crown recemented this month is routine. The same crown swallowed with the tooth decayed underneath is a much bigger conversation.
  • Someone local needs a baseline. If a crown chips on a Friday night, you want a practice that already has your X-rays and knows what's under the porcelain.
Worth knowing: we don't need your notes from abroad (though bring anything you have). A check-up with X-rays tells us most of what we need — what's under each crown, how the implants sit in the bone, and what's healthy. You get it all explained, in writing.

What looking after it costs here

Check-up — full examination + written plan
X-rays £10 each if needed
£65 £45
Air-Flow hygiene clean — designed for implants & crowns
£107 without a check-up first (Direct Access)
£92
Emergency appointment — chipped crown, pain, swelling
£50

The Air-Flow clean matters more than most people realise: it uses a fine powder jet rather than metal scraping, which is exactly what implant surfaces and porcelain need — thorough, but gentle on the work you've paid for. Twice a year is the sensible rhythm for a heavily restored mouth.

If something's already wrong

Bleeding gums around implants, a crown that clicks or moves, a bad taste near one tooth, or gums that look like they're shrinking back — book an emergency appointment rather than waiting for your next trip abroad. We'll tell you honestly whether it's something to watch, something to fix here, or something worth taking back to the original dentist under their guarantee — that's sometimes genuinely the right answer, and we'll say so.

And if repairs are needed, you'll get written prices before anything happens. Our implant dentist, Dr Savan Zala, holds an MSc in dental implantology and looks after implant patients whoever placed them.

The questions people ask us

Will you judge me for going abroad?
No. It's your mouth and your money, and plenty of overseas work is good. Our only interest is keeping whatever you have healthy from here on. The same promise we make to people who haven't seen a dentist in ten years applies to you: no lectures.
Can you clean around implants and full crowns?
Yes — it's exactly what our Air-Flow (GBT) equipment is for. The powder-jet system cleans implant surfaces and porcelain without scratching them, which old-fashioned metal scaling can. £92, or £107 if you'd rather come straight to the hygienist without a check-up first.
A crown from abroad has come off. Can you refit it?
Usually, and often the same day — bring the crown with you. If it can't be safely recemented we'll explain why and what the options cost before doing anything.
Do I need to transfer my records from the overseas clinic?
No. Bring anything you have — but a £45 examination with X-rays gives us our own picture, which is what we'd want anyway.

Start with a clean and a check.

Half an hour, £45, everything in writing — and your new teeth get a local home.

Rugby Smiles Dental Clinic · 3 Newbold Road, Rugby CV21 2LQ · 01788 579 577

Implants done abroad: what we look for when they come home

Implants placed overseas are not automatically bad, and plenty are excellent. The difficulties UK dentists are asked to sort out most often follow a pattern: implants loaded with teeth within days, before the bone has had time to fuse; crowns cemented rather than screwed onto implants of a brand nobody in the UK can identify, so nothing can be unscrewed, repaired or replaced; and gum disease left untreated underneath a brand-new bridge. None of those shows up on the flight home. They show up months later as looseness, swelling or a bridge that cannot be cleaned.

  • What we can usually do: treat infection, manage gum disease around implants, replace a lost crown where the implant system is known, and keep an honest eye on bone levels with X-rays
  • What we cannot do: source parts for an implant brand with no UK supplier, or undo bone lost to a failed implant without grafting
  • What to bring: any paperwork naming the implant system and sizes, and the X-rays or scan from the clinic. With those, most problems are fixable

The first appointment is an assessment, not a judgement. It tells you which of the above you have, what it would cost to put right, and whether the right answer is to leave well alone. Prices for the work itself are the same as for anyone else: a replacement single implant with its crown is £3,000, a graft £400, and hygiene with Airflow £92. The full picture is on our dental implants in Rugby page.