| Aesthetic Care
Esthetics in dentistry refers to two basic ideas. One is whitening teeth and the other is changing the shape of your teeth.
Bleaching is limited to whitening and can be done either at home or in a dental office. It involves using a peroxide solution to literally "bleach" your teeth. How white you can get them depends on how concentrated the solution is and how long you can keep it on your teeth. It also depends to a great extent on how dark or stained your teeth are to begin with. Bleaching does not involve physically changing the shape of your teeth.
Bondings are of two types. One is a resin that your dentist will apply directly to your teeth while you sit in the dental chair. Your dentist will contour the bonding as you sit there and will "cure" the material with a light to harden it. A porcelain veneer is the same idea except it's done in porcelain. Porcelain veneers or bondings almost always require the tooth or teeth to be prepped or ground down a bit. The "grinding down" of the tooth is not as great as with a cap or crown because enamel has to be left on the tooth for the veneer to adhere to.
|
