I am a 60 year old female who has had dental problems, crowns, root canal therapy, etc. all of my life. My dentist told me at my last visit that I need 4 crowns replaced. I'm really tired of spending this much money, which by the way I don't have, and I am considering dentures.
What would you recommend? Dentistry is so expensive and I do go for a check up every 6 months.

Depends on how many teeth you still have. My understanding is that the upper plate is much easier to make and keep in versus the lower plate never really fits properly.

How many upper teeth are still there? For the cost of the 4 caps you could have an upper plate made. There are drawbacks though to this as you just can't change your mind and have the teeth put back in. We are about the same age and I have considered what you are considering and if I lose any more upper teeth I probably will have a plate made. I had periodontal disease and had the gums "scraped" and this has left me with receding gums. Wonderful fun. Every so many years I have to have the roots that are exposed covered up again and that is not cheap to do. My teeth have shifted around and now I have a gap between my 2 front upper teeth. Swell. Never had that before. When things do get worse, I will get a plate.

This is going to be a personal decision on your part. Dentures are something that you have to get used to eating food with and I understand from other people I've talked with who have them, it was not a fun experience.

What was the reason your dentist said your crowns needed replaced? How old are they?

You want to be sure you have good bone to support a denture. Remember that once you loose teeth you immediately loose the bone that supports a denture which, as time goes on, will make it more difficult to wear a denture.

If the dentist wants to replace your crowns due to cavities then by all means replace the crowns as long as the bone levels are still good around the teeth.

It's difficult to give you any kind of input I'd need to see photos and x-rays so I hope this helps.

Good luck.