A broken front tooth
Question:
My son has a broken front tooth. Maybe a third or
half of it broke off. I'd really like to avoid having him get a crown on a
front tooth when he's so young. Is there any other way to fix it?
Answer:
It takes artistic talent, but an expert cosmetic
dentist can repair a broken front tooth, even when as much of half of it
is gone. This is done with tooth bonding
material. The cosmetic dentist will sculpt some of this tooth colored
material onto the tooth, harden it, and then polish it to a beautiful
shine. Doing this requires an extensive knowledge of tooth color and
translucency, plus it requires some sculpting skill. In addition, the
cosmetic dentist usually needs to have an extensive selection of bonding
materials in stock of various shades, consistencies, translucencies, and
polishability. Expert cosmetic
dentists are trained to be able to fix a broken tooth in this manner, but
I wouldn't trust a family dentist to do this.
If your dentist says that you need to have a crown
for a broken front tooth, that may indicate that he or she lacks
confidence in his or her artistic ability, to do beautiful bonding work
like this.
I have a sample of a repair like this posted below
from expert New Jersey cosmetic dentist Dr. Richard Champagne, in
Morganville, New Jersey. While this direct bonding technique results in a
tooth that isn't as strong as if it had been restored with a crown, if a
dentist is good at the direct bonding, this will usually be the preference
on a young person. A crown on a front tooth on a young person requires a
lot of grinding down of the tooth and sometimes results in a lifetime of
trouble over the patient's front teeth.
When repaired with tooth bonding, only a small
portion of the tooth has to be shaved in order to get the material to bond
to the tooth. And, if the dentist is truly an artist, matching the color
of the adjacent front tooth is much easier this way than trying to match
it with a crown done in a distant lab.
—Dr. Hall
|
Here's a young man just after an
unfortunate accident resulting in a broken front tooth. I doubt he'd want to be seen in public
with this.
Click on the photo to see a close up picture of his smile.
|
In about an hour, an expert cosmetic
dentist can restore this broken tooth and make it look like it was never broken.
Click to see the enlargement and notice how beautifully natural the repair
looks.
Click on the photo to see a close up picture of his smile. |
Click here for
referral to an expert cosmetic dentist.
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about cosmetic dentistry page.
