Teeth Whitening

Teeth Whitening Treatments

Teeth Whitening is one of the best methods of improving your smile, which over 90 percent of the population can benefit from. Whether you have always wanted a brighter smile, or if over time your teeth have become more discoloured or less whiter, teeth whitening is the number one method of choice to restore or enhance their shade.

Here at Dulwich Dental Office in London, we have completed over 5000 whitening procedures with a 100% success rate. An initial assessment of your teeth will be performed in your consultation session and the most suitable treatment is chosen with you.

In order to understand what causes your teeth to discolour and how treatment can benefit, its important to understand the basic anatomy. Your tooth has an outer thin layer called enamel and an inner thicker layer called dentine. The enamel is the more whiter layer than the dentine, the dentine contains tubules which lead to the inner chamber of the tooth which contains the vascular and nervous supply to the tooth. When you consume foods or drinks the pigments can attach to the tooth surface and penetrate the outer layer. Our teeth are exposed daily to such substances and over time the pigments from these are transferred to the teeth. This staining is termed intrinsic staining and is the most common cause of patients seeking our teeth whitening services. In some patients there may have developmental defects of the enamel and dentine, that predispose their teeth to discoloration more than the general population, or indeed are themselves the cause of tooth discoloration. In patients that have had fillings discoloration around the filling may occur. In most cases teeth whitening is the ideal solution either on its own or as part of a wider treatment plan.
Discoloration of the tooth may also occur due to deep decay or trauma. Where the tooth has become non-vital the pulp chamber changes may show through to the outer layers of the tooth causing discoloration. This is often termed intrinsic staining, and whilst it can be treated it may need a different approach then more conventional teeth whitening.

Although most patients present to us with extrinsic staining when you visit Dulwich Dental Office we will spend some time at your consultation assessing the causes of discoloration by taking a medical, dental and social history as all of these can contribute towards staining and discoloration. Its important we also assess your mouth as a whole as if there is any other pathology such as swollen gums, or undiagnosed dental decay it may be safer to treat this first, as whitening is the safest in a healthy dentition. We will take a shade of your tooth using a vita shade guide that is internationally used to classify tooth shade colour. The shade that is closest to the tooth on the shade guide is chosen to be your base or initial colour before treatment and recorded. Most patient are capable of reaching Hollywood white though you will have good control of how white you reach, and its certainly true that the shade of whiteness is also defined by your genetic pre-determined structure of your tooth. Every patient will whiten differently and to a different extent.

Whilst there are various options of teeth whitening in the mass media none are safer and produce the best results then custom mould of the teeth, creation of specialised whitening trays then using carbamide peroxide in these trays to whiten the teeth. This is often termed at home bleaching or day/night whitening, however its somewhat of a misnomer as the process is highly driven and created by our dental surgeons.

There are 3 main stages of the teeth whitening process

We will firstly take an accurate mould of your teeth using an impression material such as alginate or a silicone polymer. In some cases we may use a digital scanner though we find with teeth whitening this is not always necessary. The mould will allow our dental technicians to carry on with the next stage of the teeth whitening process.

Within twenty four hours our dental technicians will cast the mould into a stone model which is an exact copy of your teeth including their surrounding soft tissues. A vacuum form mould is then constructed with a precise gap where we wish the teeth whitening carmamide peroxide to stay. This ensures that the carbamide peroxide whitening agent does not go anywhere else in the mouth but onto the tooth surface which we require it to, therefore affording complete safety. The trays that are custom constructed for you are designed to millimetre precision to fit your teeth, and are off the highest standards and only constructed by UK general dental council registered technicians.

At your next visit to us, our dentists would have undergone a five point check on your trays, then will try them on your teeth to make sure they fit nicely. We will show you the two types of whitening schedules you can use and the benefits of both. In general we can prescribe you a day whitening system where you only need to leave the trays in for a few minutes in the daytime to get the results you wish, or if you prefer we also have a night time gel where you can leave the trays in overnight. Some of our gel systems are designed to guarantee you a B1 shade which is often regarded to be one of the most white but natural looking shades possible. We estimate that from 7 to 14 days you will get to the white shade that you desire. Should you wish to maintain your results over time you do not need to undergo the whole procedure again, just simply use the same trays and gel that has been provided for a top up of the whitening result.

Teeth whitening in our experience is one of the most fulfilling and simplest methods to improve your smile. Whether you want a more brighter, more whiter, all the way to a Hollywood smile, Dulwich dental office is the perfect clinic to get you the results you wish.