Dr hall,
I messed up and didn’t know I couldn’t use abrasive toothpaste on veneers. For the past two months I have been using crest 3d vivid toothpaste on my new porcelain veneers. What are the chances they are scratched or the glaze will come off now? Will they not last as long in terms of shine now? I’m going to order Supersmile toothpaste tonight! So sad of my veneers at ruined,
– John from Florida
John,
The abrasive toothpaste will not scratch the porcelain – the porcelain surface is too hard. What it does is scratch and wear away the bonding composite that bonds the porcelain to the tooth. That bonding composite forms a very thin line around the entire veneer – it will vary a lot with the technique of the dentist and the ceramist, but it might be, say, 100-200 microns which would be about the thickness of three to five hairs. So if you have been using the abrasive toothpaste for only two months, you probably won’t notice anything yet. When that bonding composite is scratched, it might pick up stain more and what you would see would be a line of stain around the veneer. And then the other problem with the abrasive toothpaste is that it wears away that composite so that you would form a tiny, almost microscopic “ditch” around the veneer which would be an attraction for plaque and a vulnerability where decay could attack.
It’s just a prudent maintenance thing to use the Supersmile toothpaste on expensive cosmetic work – kind of like changing your oil in your car. You aren’t going to ruin your car because you went 1000 miles over the limit before changing the oil one time. Just get on the regular, sensible maintenance with the Supersmile toothpaste from here on out and you should be fine.
Now if you had direct composite bonding on your teeth, that would be a different story. The composite, like the bonding composite between the porcelain and your tooth, is a softer material and the shine can dull easily. But your expert cosmetic dentist should be able to re-polish the bonding and restore the shine.
Dr. Hall
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About David A. Hall
Dr. David A. Hall was one of the first 40 accredited cosmetic dentists in the world. He practiced cosmetic dentistry in Iowa, and in 1990 earned his accreditation with the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry. He is now president of Infinity Dental Web, a company in Mesa, Arizona that does advanced internet marketing for dentists.
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