Esthetic or Cosmetic Dentistry is actually a vast and not very well defined field of dentistry, but it can be described as a variety of dental procedures that improve the appearance of a person's smile and teeth.  The following procedures can be utilized in Esthetic Dentistry:

• Tooth Whitening (Bleaching)

• Veneers

• Bonding

• Ceramic or Resin Inlays

• Enamel Shaping

• Braces

Each of these have a specific effect on appearance.  Some of them can be replaced with each other to achieve the same cosmetic effect, others are mutually exclusive.  We will briefly examine these procedures below, however, we will mainly focus on the Veneers and Bonding in this section, since the other procedures are covered in more detail in other sections.

Tooth Whitening (Bleaching)

Procedures designed to brighten teeth that are discolored or stained. Bleaching may be done completely in the dental office or the dentist may dispense a system for you to use at home.  Please go to the Whitening section for more details.

Veneers

Veneers are thin custom-made shells designed to cover the front side of teeth. Made of tooth-colored materials, veneers are used to treat spaces between teeth and teeth that are chipped or worn, permanently stained, poorly shaped or slightly crooked.  We will focus more on Veneers below.

Bonding

Bonding can improve the appearance of teeth that are chipped, broken, cracked, stained, or have spaces between them. With bonding, tooth-colored materials are applied, or bonded, to the tooth surface. We will focus more on Bonding below.

Ceramic or Resin Inlays

These are the cosmetic alternative to amalgam (silver) fillings.  They are matched to the color of your particular tooth and can make a restoration look very natural.  Please go to the Fillings & Inlays section for more information.

Enamel Shaping

Enamel Shaping involves modifying teeth to improve their appearance by removing or contouring enamel. The process, which often is combined with bonding, usually is quick and comfortable and the results can be seen immediately.

Braces

Braces are not just for kids. Orthodontics may be needed if teeth are crooked, crowded or do not meet properly. If your dentist thinks you should see a specialist for treatment, he or she will refer you to an orthodontist. Please go to the Orthodontics section for more information.

Ceramic Veneers

Ceramic Veneers, also often referred to as porcelain laminates or laminate veneers, are very thin custom-made shells crafted of tooth-colored materials (porcelain) designed to cover the front side of teeth. They're made by a dental technician, usually in a dental lab, working from a model provided by your dentist.

You should know that this is usually an irreversible process, because it's necessary to remove a small amount of enamel from your teeth to accommodate the shell.

You can appreciate in the image above how thin these porcelain shells are, as they transmit the color of the stone cast through their ceramic layers.  Despite their fragility in their unbonded state, once they are bonded to the tooth with the proper bonding agents they can be very strong and durable.

It is apparent that one has complete control over the final esthetic outcome with veneers.  One can control both, color and shape with veneers, which makes them incredibly versatile when it comes to solving esthetic challenges.

The Planning

When the decision has been made to utilize veneers as the cosmetic procedure of choice, your dentist will most likely do a preliminary wax-up, which will show on a stone cast of our teeth what the final product will look like.  Below you can see a typical preliminary wax-up.

The Procedure

The veneer procedure is relatively straight forward.  Your dentist will reshape the outer surface of the selected teeth slightly and take a final impression.  He will then place temporary veneers on the prepared teeth which will remain in place until the final veneers come back from the dental laboratory.  At this point the exact shade will also be determined.  On some occasions (when your shading is very complex) your dentist may actually send you to the laboratory technician to have your shades taken.

The Laboratory

The dental laboratories are often the unsung heroes in the dental profession.  It is the laboratory technician's expertise and skill that helps transform an unsatisfactory smile to a "million-dollar-smile".  Working successfully with ceramics is truly an art form that requires many years of training and and expertise.  The turn-around-time for most laboratories for a veneer case is approximately 3 to 4 weeks.  Once the veneers are finished they will be delivered back to your dentist's office.

Your Dentist will schedule you for your delivery appointment once the veneers are returned from the laboratory.  During this appointment the temporary veneers will be removed and the final veneers will be tried in.  Once approved by you, they will be bonded to the teeth.

Although the veneers are very strong and durable in their bonded state, they can still be damaged when challenged with hard objects such as ice cubes or nut shell.  However, these can even cause damage to healthy teeth, so common sense should preserve your veneers quite well.  As you can see below, veneers can easily convert a challenging esthetic situation into a great smile.

Bonding can be a very quick and economical way to take care of small esthetic defects.  Bonding is usually less expensive than veneers and can be done in one appointment.  It is however not always a good substitute for veneers.  If you have a gap in between two of your front teeth but you don’t want braces, or you have a minor chip that is too small a problem for veneers you might be the perfect candidate for dental bonding.

Whether your teeth have been chipped, stained or cracked dental bonding can help. In fact, dental bonding procedures are used not only to repair physical damage, but also hereditary flaws and some structural damage that has been caused by decay.

Dental bonding involves the use of composite resin that is specially designed so that it can be color-matched to each patient’s teeth to provide a completely natural-looking result.

As with most dental procedures, the more teeth a patient needs fixed, the longer the procedure will take, however minor dental bonding can usually be done in about an hour.

The procedure involves a dentist first applying an etching solution to the patient’s damaged teeth (when decay is involved the damaged area will need to be drilled out first). The etching solution creates grooves that allow for proper adhesion of the composite resin bonding agent. The resin is then applied to the teeth in layers. After each layer is applied it is hardened with a powerful, specially designed light. Once the appropriate number of resin layers has been applied and hardened the tooth can be sculpted and polished until a comfortable and aesthetically pleasing result is achieved.