In today’s age of technology, your dentist has a range of options to help your teeth look great. Stained teeth, dark teeth, chipped teeth, crooked teeth, and even teeth that are missing altogether, can be repaired or replaced. Cosmetic or aesthetic dentistry is the broad heading under which many dental procedures that improve the appearance of teeth may be described.
The latest developments in dentistry include tooth whitening treatments, micro-abrasion, bonding and veneers. These techniques can whiten and improve the shape and colour of your teeth, even close gaps.
Tooth Whitening – treatments are designed to whiten your own teeth without any artificial additions. There are several ways dentists can whiten your teeth – with very high peroxide gel concentrations, the dentist may very carefully apply the gel and use some heat from a light source (sometimes a laser is used) to whiten the teeth in a short time. This technique is not common, usually expensive and not re-usable. Alternatively plastic trays are custom-made by your dentist using models of your teeth, and then you administer the treatment yourself using safe-strength gels at home. These custom made trays have the big advantage of being re-usable with refill kits.
Micro-abrasion – Micro-abrasion can be used to remove discolouration in the surface layer of the enamel. A paste containing a buffered gel and an abrasive is used to remove a thin layer of the tooth enamel. If the discolouration is deep in the enamel your dentist may need to remove the affected enamel with a bur and place an adhesive tooth coloured filling. Usually an anaesthetic is not required.
Bonding – Bonding is a process whereby your dentist cleans and prepares the surface of your teeth and then bonds tooth coloured resin fillings to them. Bonding can be used to repair chipped teeth, close small gaps between teeth, alter the shape of teeth and sometimes cover discolouration in teeth. Bonded resins are simple to re-polish and replace if they eventually discolour.
Veneers – Veneers are thin (usually about 0.5mm thick) pieces of porcelain or composite material, which are bonded to the front surface of the teeth. Veneers can be used to improve the appearance of teeth by changing the shape of the teeth, by changing the colour of the teeth, by masking stains and by replacing small fractured pieces of teeth.
