Category — Dental Care

Porcelain veneers are made out of a thin porcelain material. They are attached to the front of your teeth to cosmetically enhance your smile. They have become a very common cosmetic dentistry procedure and can make a great addition to your smile makeover.

Porcelain veneers can be used to:

• Restore worn or chipped teeth

• Cover stained teeth

• Close gaps between your teeth

• Lengthen your teeth

• Straighten crooked teeth

Benefits of Porcelain Veneers

Porcelain veneers provide you with an excellent way to cosmetically improve your smile. They resemble your natural tooth structure more than other materials used in tooth restoration. The porcelain material is very durable and will last a long time. Veneers allow your cosmetic dentist to adjust the color and translucency in order to match the appearance of your natural teeth. They are also very stain-resistant, which will help keep your smile bright for years to come.

Why Do Porcelain Veneers Look So Natural?

The ceramic material used for porcelain veneers is translucent and therefore closely mirrors the properties of your natural tooth enamel. When light hits your teeth, it goes through your enamel and reflects off of the dentin, the opaque inner substance of your teeth. It is this translucency of your enamel that provides your teeth with their shine. The translucent properties of porcelain veneers enable them to reproduce the luster of natural teeth.

The Importance of Using an Experienced Cosmetic Dentist

The installation of porcelain veneers requires an artistry generally lacked by general dentists. When done right, porcelain veneers will provide you with a vastly improved smile that will leave you beaming with self-confidence. When done poorly, they will look terrible and leave you wondering why you wasted your money.

In order to achieve the proper results, it is important to have your porcelain veneers done by an experienced cosmetic dentist. Cosmetic dentists approach dentistry with a keen artistic eye and have as their main purpose the aesthetic improvement of your smile. General dentists, on the other hand, are usually much more concerned with functionality than with aesthetics. As a result, veneers installed by a general dentist may not provide you with the improved appearance that you desire.

Cosmetic dentistry is a specialization that requires a great deal of training beyond dental school. By going to a highly trained cosmetic dentist, you will ensure that your porcelain veneers accomplish the desired purpose of making your smile as dynamic and beautiful as possible.

To learn more about porcelain veneers, please contact the Los Angeles, California cosmetic dentist Dr. Kevin Sands today to schedule a consultation.

Porcelain veneers are an excellent solution for people with discolored crooked, gapped, worn, or cracked teeth. In fact, in many ways porcelain veneers are the flagship cosmetic dental treatment because they can essentially give a person a whole new smile all at once. In addition, porcelain veneers can be a great protective treatment for your teeth.

Decay Resistant

Unlike tooth enamel, the ceramic laminate used to make porcelain veneers neither decays as a result of exposure to the acid byproducts of mouth-dwelling bacteria or stains as a result of exposure to melanoidins found in foods like coffee, black tea, chocolate, and red wine. This means that porcelain veneers can not only give you a great-looking smile, they can give you a smile that lasts. In addition, they can strengthen your teeth by providing an additional layer of support, almost like the layered composite armor used on modern main battle tanks. However, the teeth behind the veneers are still susceptible to decay, and there are some special considerations you should keep in mind about cavities in veneered teeth.

Behind the Veneer

The veneer itself is made of pressed laminate ceramic, which is very strong, and the veneer is attached to the tooth by means of a plastic compound sometimes called cement. Before the veneers are placed or crafted, the teeth are prepared to receive them through the removal of dental enamel. The amount of enamel removed varies, both according to the preferences and the technique of the dentist doing the preparation, and it is unlikely to be completely uniform. Normally, the amount removed is between 0.3 and 0.5 mm, often leaving little to no enamel on the prepared surface. Fortunately, the prepared surface is protected by the veneer.

Possible Dangers

Cavities can still attack veneered teeth. If veneers are placed by an inexperienced or unskilled dentist, there may be ledges, shelves, or other harborages around the edges of the veneers where food can accumulate and bacteria hide from cleanings. In these locations, plaque can build up, and the acid produced by the bacteria can lead to decay around the edges of the veneers. If undetected, these edge cavities can grow and allow bacteria access to the tooth pulp, necessitating a root canal and capping the tooth with a dental crown.

People often think porcelain veneers are likely to chip, but in fact it is much more likely that the compound bonding the veneer to the tooth will fail and the veneer come loose. This becomes more likely if a person consumes a great deal of alcohol, which dissolves some bonding compounds. Worse than an actual separation of the veneer is if some of the bond gets dissolved and creates a void behind the veneer which can again serve as a harborage for bacteria, leading to concealed decay that attacks the tooth and may not be detected until pain begins.

Prevention Better than Cure

As with all dental treatment, prevention is the best approach. With proper care, you can protect your veneered teeth from any of the negative effects we’ve discussed above. First, make sure you have chosen a talented and well-trained cosmetic dentist who uses the highest-quality restorations. Veneers that are properly shaped and placed can remove the possibility of harborages around the veneers. Brush and floss your teeth according to your dentist’s instructions. Make all your semi-annual cleaning and follow-up appointments to catch any decay before it progresses to the level of a serious threat. Limit alcohol consumption and clean your teeth immediately after vomiting to reduce the dissolution of the dental bonding material.

If you do all this, your veneers will last a decade or more protecting your teeth and keeping them stain-free.

Porcelain veneers are very thin shells of ceramic material that are permanently bonded to the front surface of your teeth. Each veneer is fully customized for you and color-matched to blend in with your surrounding teeth.

Porcelain veneers are versatile and can address many different cosmetic dental issues such as:

Chipped and/or broken teeth Crooked or unevenly worn teeth Crowded teeth Stains due to injury, root canals or antibiotics Discolored fillings

How the Veneer Process Works

Applying porcelain veneers takes about a month from start to finish and typically involves three appointments with your cosmetic dentist.

Appointment #1 – You have an initial consultation with the cosmetic dentist to discuss your current dental issues, your desired end results and the dentist’s opinion for the best solution to achieve your ideal smile.

Some of the determining factors in deciding if you are a candidate for veneers are:

Do you have healthy teeth? Do you have any active decay or gum disease? Do you have adequate enamel? Do you clench or grind your teeth? Do you have severely misaligned teeth or an unstable bite?

If you decide together that porcelain veneers are the best option, you can then schedule the rest of your visits.

Appointment #2 – During your second appointment, the teeth requiring veneers will be slightly shaved down to accommodate the thickness of the veneers and then a mold, or impression, will be taken of your teeth. Your cosmetic dentist will send the impression to a dental lab, which will then fabricate the veneers. It takes the lab approximately two weeks to make the veneers and send them back to your cosmetic dentist.  You will wear temporary veneers while your final ones are being prepared.  The quality of temporary veneers varies widely from dentist to dentist, and this is one important factor to consider when selecting your cosmetic dentist.

Appointment #3 – This is the most exciting appointment because you’ll leave with a dazzling and beautiful new smile. In this appointment, the veneers will be temporarily placed on your teeth, and adjusted until both you and your cosmetic dentist are happy with them. Then they’ll be permanently cemented to your teeth, and actually becoming a part of those teeth.

How will the completed porcelain veneers look?

Placed correctly, porcelain veneers look virtually identical to your natural teeth. The porcelain has slight variations in color just as regular teeth do and while porcelain veneers are as durable as natural teeth, they are not impervious to damage. Anything that will break a real tooth can break a veneer.

Only a qualified cosmetic dentist can design and place veneers that will blend in almost perfectly with the rest of your natural teeth.