Drilling? No Thanks! With Icon, the revolutionary treatment for early cavities and white spots on teeth...without drilling

Traditionally, if we as dentists came across a patient that had a very early stage cavity, we would either apply fluoride or a remineralizing agent and try to prevent the cavity from progressing, or we would tell the patient "lets just watch that cavity, we will evaluate it at your next checkup." At that time, if the cavity had got deeper, we would finally have no choice but to "drill and fill." The fluoride therapy is not always effective, and drilling and filling almost always sacrifices large amounts of healthy tooth structure.

Today, there is a revolutionary new dental material called Icon, introduced by DMG, a German company. Icon presents a breakthrough micro-invasive technology that allows dentists to fill and reinforce demineralized enamel of early stage cavities without drilling or anesthesia.Icon can arrest the progress of early cavities in one simple procedure, without unnecessary loss of healthy tooth structure.

Another common situation that dentists encounter is white spots on teeth, spots that not only look unsightly but also develop into cavities, turn ugly brown and usually need drilling to make cosmetic improvements. Icon is revolutionizing the cosmetic treatment of these carious white spots. When these white spots are infiltrated with Icon, they take on the appearance of the surrounding healthy enamel, all in one visit, in one simple step, with no drilling.

Pearl Dental Center, Newtown Family Dentistry, now has a Cavity Free Club

We encourage our patients to take preventive measures to combat tooth decay, we recommend a healthy  diet    that cuts down sugar and acid intake, we ask them to avoid excessive consumption of sodas, cookies, candies,
we advise parents to refrain from giving their kids between-meals snacks, we recommend fluoride rinses and
mouthwashes- all this so our patients can be cavity free!

It is only fitting, when a child is found to be cavity free, largely by following all the regimen recommended  by the dental profession, that we celebrate this achievement, announce it and reward the child with  a prize.

Therefore, Pearl Dental Center, Newtown Family Dentistry announces the formation of a Cavity Free Club.
 All children upto age 18 are eligible to join. Their name and photo will be put up  on our website, they will be given  coupons for  a   healthy snack (such as frozen fat-free yogurt) and will be considered our ambassadors for talking to school kids  about growing up cavity-free.

Be on the lookout for the first member of our Cavity Free Club.




























































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Dental Pearls: Porcelain Veneers in One Hour-New permanent Cerinate Veneers

Dental Pearls: Porcelain Veneers in One Hour-New permanent Cerinate Veneers

Porcelain Veneers in One Hour-New permanent Cerinate Veneers

You can now have permanent Porcelain Veneers made in one hour right in our office. At Pearl Dental Center, Newtown Family Dentistry, we now place the Denmat Cerinate One -Hour Porcelain Veneers in one visit.

Gone are the days when we would have to file down the teeth extensively, then take impressions to send to the laboratory to fabricate the permanent veneers, place temporaries on your teeth, then bring you back for a second visit for placement of the permanent veneers.

And since there are no laboratory fees involved and since there is no need for a second visit, the fees for the one-hour veneers are also considerably less than the lab-fabricated veneers.

On the other hand, if you needed instant cosmetic improvements or needed to cut down on the cost factor, you could get direct bonding done on your teeth: no laboratory procedures are needed in direct bonding but the material used in bonding is not porcelain but composite resin, which is not as durable or as stain-resistant as porcelain.

Now, with Cerinate one-hour permanent porcelain veneers, the advantageas are:
- very little drilling, if any
- no sensitivity
- considerably less expensive (in our office, actually less than the bonding)
- instant results, in about an hour

Interest-free financing for 18-24 months can be arranged through Care Credit or Chase to make the Cerinate one-hour permanent porcelain veneers more affordable so give you that winning smile you always wanted!

Cosmetic Dentistry- Teeth Bonding

In the previous blog I had discussed one of the reasons why a patient may prefer to get direct bonding done in the dentist's officwe instead of porcelain veneers (which involve laboratory fabrication) to achieve cosmetic improvements of teeth.

Another reason why a patient may prefer direct bonding is that there is often less tooth structure reduction for the dentist to bond resins on teeth compared to placing porcelain veneers. If a person has chips, cracks or discolorations on teeth, if there are spaces between the teeth, if they are irregularly placed, these can be corrected by bonding tooth colored material (that we call composite resins) on the teeth in thin layers. After the dentist and patient are satisfied with the improvements to the smile, the bonding is polished to a high gloss and finish and viola!  its all done.

Some more reasons, especially from the dentist's point of view, in another blog.

Before Cosmetic Dentistry

After Cosmetic Teeth Bonding in office
in one visit



After Cosmetic Dentistry-Bonding



Advantages of Direct Bonding for Cosmetic Dental Improvements

In cosmetic dentistry, the most commonly used method of improving the smile is to place porcelain veneers on teeth.  However, there are situations in which direct bonding, done in the office, using composite resin, may be the treatment of choice.  I will discuss a couple of issues here today.
From the patient's point of view, the most common reason for choosing composite resin bonding over porcelain veneers is the cost factor. Especially when the cosmetic makeover involves 6 to 8 teeth, the difference in cost of resin bonding versus porcelain veneers can be hundreds of dollars. The additional work involved in placing veneers, the huge laboratory costs for fabricating the veneers and the long term results of the porcelain veneers naturally justify the higher fees. However, in the immediate context, some patients have to settle for direct resin bonding rather than not get any cosmetic improvements at all as they just cannot afford the porcelain.
In addition, the cosmetic impovements with direct bonding are instant, and that is a great plus for somebody who needs an immediate "fix" before an important interview or a wedding. Though tempoaries are placed while the dental laboratoy is fabricating the veneers, the temporaries are usually not as esthetic as well-made composite resin bonding veneers. Also, some patients have to move at short notice, and cannot wait for the second visit when the veneers are back from the lab.
I will discuss more issues, including dentists' considerations, in another posting.



Before Cosmetic Tooth Bonding
Note the spaces and irregular teeth



After cosmetic teeth bonding:
one visit, less expensive

Before

After

Mini Dental Implant to the rescue -

A patient of mine who is a school teacher was all stressed out one afternoon because she was afraid a front tooth was going to fall out right in front of her students in her classroom. She had a baby tooth that did not fall off in childhood. That was because the permanent tooth underneath that baby tooth was congenitally missing. As the permant teeth around the baby tooth grew in, the baby tooth looked shorter and smaller and was very noticeable. Finally, it got so loose that our schoolteacher was afraid the tooth could fall out in front of all her students while she was taking a class!

After some xrays and photographs, I extracted the baby tooth, inserted a mini dental implant (from 3M IMTEC) in its place and built up a tooth on it using tooth colored bonding material. Voila! In 45 minutes I had rescued her from what could have been a disaster. After a few weeks I proceeded to place a permanent crown on the mini dental implant.

Just for the record, I have placed mini dental implants in the upper jaw and built up a tooth on them using bonding material (composite resin) and sometimes the patients are so happy with this they decide not to proceed with the permanent crown. The oldest such buildups on mini dental implants have been in daily use and function since early 2005.

I have more information and photos at http://www.newtownfamilydentistry.com/ or http://www.pearldentalpa/.

The most common indication for Mini Dental Implants

The single most widely used application of Mini Dental Implants is for stabilization of lower full dentures. Four or five mini dental implants inserted into the lower jaw, without major gum and bone surgery, minimum local anesthesia, no sutures, very minimal post-operative pain, is the ideal situation for the patient and the dentist. The cost factor of the mini dental implants to the patient is also more tolerable than comparable standard implants.
However, the bone in the upper jaw is generally less dense that in the lower jaw. As a result, mini dental implants are usually less firm in the upper jaw than in the lower jaw, and are often loose right at the time of placement or become loose soon after the upper denture starts taking support from the mini dental implants. As a result, the wider standard implants may be better in the upper jaw.
I will talk about the use of the mini dental implants for crowns and bridges soon.
I have more details at my website http://www.newtownfamilydentistry.com/ or http://www.pearldentalpa.com/

Mini Dental Implants Contraindications

Though Mini Dental Implants cost a lot less than standard dental implants and also involve less invasive surgery and shorter healing time, there are many situations where mini dental implants simply cannot act as a substitute for the standard, wider implants.
If you have a fractured tooth right in the front of your mouth and a root canal, post and crown would not be feasible or would have questionable success, your best case scenario would be to extract the tooth and insert an implant right away, immediately following the extraction. This is where you would like to have a mini dental implant inserted, especially since it is less expensive. However, mini dental implants have to be inserted into dense, mature, fully healed bone where the extraction site of the fractured tooth is healed up completely. On the day of the extraction, the extraction site is still too wide open and so the mini implant will not anchor. Even with bone grafting, filling up of the socket with dense, mature bone could take months. On the other hand, a standard implant could very easily be inserted into the extraction site and possibly even be used to support a temporary crown on it the very same day.

In my next post I will write about situations where the mini dental implants would be the preferable method of treatment and work very well. In particular, I have had very good results with 3M Espe (IMTEC) mini dental implants.

Please come back again. In the meantime, for photos of various mini dental implant applications, go to my site at www.newtownfamilydentistry.com