Composite Bonding

A patient came to see us complaining of the appearance of her front teeth. Her primary complaint was the gaps in her upper front teeth. She also did not like the shape of some of the front teeth. The patient was very keen to fix these problems and was concerned with the idea of damaging her teeth to achieve this or in any way making her mouth less healthy. On examining the teeth, it was noted that there were some significant spaces between the upper front teeth and that some of the teeth were “peg-shaped” meaning that their length was not in good proportion to their width.

Numerous options were discussed with the patient, as at our clinic, we pride ourselves on giving the patient as much input as possible into their treatment plan. We understand that every patient is an individual and that no one treatment plan can be exactly the same. Given that the patient wanted to leave her teeth undamaged, we opted for composite bonding to close her spaces.

Composite bonding is the process of adding dental composite resin (white filling material) to the teeth, in order to enhance their appearance. This may involve restoring a chipped edge, a worn edge, some dental decay, lengthening a tooth or as in this case, closing a space. The composite bonding is bonded to the tooth surface using a dental adhesive. The bond is strong and long lasting. The composite bonding is placed in layers to replicate the natural structure of the tooth. There are dentine layers and enamel layers and sometimes stains and tints to add character to the restoration, depending on the appearance of the natural tooth being restored. In most cases, composite bonding removes no tooth structure and therefore requires no injections to numb the teeth. This is a good reason why composite bonding is one of the more popular cosmetic dental procedure carries out at our clinic. The restorations can be polished to a nice shine and textured to mimic the adjacent teeth.

This patient underwent some invisible braces first to align her lower teeth. After alignment, composite bonding was placed to four front teeth to close the gaps and improve the proportions of the teeth. The patient was thrilled with the result and the case won a national Smile Award for excellence in cosmetic dentistry.

Below are the before and after pictures of the case.

will.shaw 17.11.13 Dentistry