A bright smile is a confident smile!

Today more and more people are whitening their teeth. The results can be quite dramatic. I should note however that results do vary, and not everyone gets the results they desire with just whitening alone.

What causes tooth discoloration?

There are many causes. The most common include aging, consumption of staining substances (coffee, tea, colas, tobacco), trauma, tetracycline (antibiotics) staining, excessive fluoride, nerve degeneration, old fillings, or tooth nerve damage.

What is it Tooth Whitening?

Tooth whitening is the process of lightening your natural teeth by applying a carbamide peroxide gel or paste to the teeth. This process works much better than whitening toothpastes. Teeth are porous like a sponge and naturally develop stains externally as well as internally over time. The bleaching process simply removes these stains from the teeth allowing them to be as light as possible.

Will it harm my teeth?

It has been proven that professional quality bleaching solutions and custom trays are perfectly safe. Though it is recommended that directions are still followed very carefully.

Who is a candidate?

Not everyone is a good candidate for tooth whitening and therefor should book a consult appointment with us to determine the best approach to whitening their teeth.

• Heavy smokers, coffee and tea drinkers are less likely to achieve good results if they do not discontinue use during the whitening process.
• As a rule of thumb younger patients' teeth tend to lighten more easily as they tend to have more yellowish teeth. Grey is perhaps the most difficult color to remove from teeth and often is found in the older patients. This is not to say that dramatic results cannot be achieved with greyer teeth.  Extended bleaching times may be required.

Who is a candidate? - Continued

• The bleaching process will not lighten crowns (caps), veneers or tooth colored fillings called composites (bonding). This is important to be aware of prior to bleaching.  Following the bleaching process, fillings and in some cases crowns may need replacing as they will no longer match the now lighter bleached teeth.
• Some individuals also have very translucent teeth particularly at the tips of their front teeth. The bleaching process can actually increase this translucency. This can create the appearance of greyer tips of the teeth following the bleaching process, due to the whitening of the body of the teeth.
• Teeth that are heavily stained with brown spots or dark grey tetracycline banding generally do not respond well to bleaching. Also non-vital (teeth that no longer have blood supply to them) that have been stained internally generally do not lighten well.

So What Next?

First, we create custom trays for you. These hold the solution in place. This is one of the huge differences between our whitening system and over the counter systems.

There is no way for a large manufacturer to create a custom tray, so these trays are very generic. The problem is that no 2 mouths are the same, so the whitening solution will not stay in the correct place for everybody using these generic trays. This can harm your gums, mouth and throat. Gel strengths for at home bleaching vary widely from 10% to 30% carbamide peroxide.  The more concentrated the gel strength the less you will need to wear them; meaning faster whitening.

How long does it last?

There are a variety of factors that can impact the duration of whitened teeth. For example, the duration of bleaching and whether the patient resumed smoking and/or coffee and tea drinking. Generally though the teeth will remain white for several years. I generally recommend to patients that to maintain white teeth they have to apply the gel once every three to six months after initial whitening.

Teeth whitening is one of the easiest, most effective methods to rejuvenate your smile! 
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