MINIMAL PREP VENEERS
Veneers are dental restorations whose main purpose is to change color, size and/or shape of our natural frontal teeth. These restorations are individually bonded to the front tooth surfaces giving a new appearance to our teeth and smile.
DIAGNOSIS – Our dear patient came to Cabdental seeking professional help on how to improve her smile. She was unhappy how her teeth and smile looked. During the first dental consultation our specialists will explain different ways how a smile can improve and the benefits of each of our procedures. Minimal prep dental veneers are convenient due to the fact that they are a conservative treatment with long term predictability. In this procedure we do not “drill” the teeth excessively and the veneers placed have a life-spam of 10 years or more. For these reasons, our patient decided to have veneers placed and change her smile forever.
SMILE DESIGN – It is essential to take photographs of the patient’s face and smile. This will help design a new smile for each patient’s necessities. Things we take in consideration when creating a smile design: size of natural teeth, smile’s length, amount of teeth and gum showing when smiling, etc. We made a smile design with a wax-up model for our patient modifying her teeth’s size, shape in a symmetric manner.
MOCK UP – Once we had a prototype of how our patient’s new smile will look, we tried it in her mouth. We try our smile designs on the patient’s mouths using temporary veneers made out of an aesthetic material. This way the patient can see a preview of how her final veneers will look like. In this phase, patients and specialists can make corrections to the temporary veneers so the final ones are perfect.
DENTAL VENEERS – Once the patient has approved the smile design with the mock-up placed over her natural teeth, it is time to take a final dental impression to have the final veneers be made. A minimal tooth preparation is required, softening sharp ridges and irregularities on the natural teeth so the final impression can be taken. Our patient decided to get lithium disilicate (e-max) veneers which is a highly aesthetic and resistant material.NEW SMILE – Veneers are bonded to the patient’s outer surface of her natural teeth. The cement used to bond them is the same color as the veneers. Once the cement is dry/hardened it is nearly impossible to remove or break the veneers from the tooth. Each dental veneer is bonded individually to each tooth, which makes flossing easy. Our patient was very pleased with her new smile.
