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Dental prostheses designed to restore a tooth by fitting around the remains of the tooth and covering more than half of the natural crown surface (i.e., artificial crowns); crowns are precision fitted and cemented to the surrounded tooth so that the patient cannot remove them. These prostheses (i.e., extracoronal restorations) are typically custom-made devices; they are made of cast metal alloys (e.g., medium-hard gold), synthetic (e.g., acrylic) resins, ceramic (porcelain), or combinations of these materials (e.g., porcelain fused to metal). Dedicated fixed dental crowns may be intended to cover more than half but not the entire natural crown (i.e., partial crowns) or to cover the entire surface of the natural crown (i.e., complete crowns); some complete crowns are supported by a metal post inserted into the root canal (i.e., post crowns).
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