Assessing Your Smile

There’s nothing quite like the good feeling of knowing you have a healthy-looking smile. An attractive, confident smile can be one of your most valuable assets. It is often the first thing people notice about you.

How do you feel about your smile? Are you pleased with it, or do you wish it looked better? At one time there were limited means for enhancing the appearance of your teeth. Today there are a number of cosmetic treatments that can be performed in the dental office in just a few appointments.

There are many common dental problems that can be easily corrected through cosmetic procedures. These problems include discolored teeth, missing teeth, overlapping front teeth, poorly shaped teeth, chipped teeth and gaps between teeth.

To assess your smile, take a moment to answer the following questions.  Take your time and answer each question as clearly and accurately as you can.  Your answers will help us to determine the type of treatment most suited to your needs.

1. Are you pleased with the general appearance of your teeth and smile?  If not, why?
2. Are your teeth straight?
3. Are there spaces between your front teeth that you dislike?
4. Are you satisfied with the color of your teeth?
5. Are you satisfied with the shape of your teeth?  
6. Are any of your teeth chipped?  Hidden? Protruding?
7. Are you satisfied with the way your teeth come together (how they bite)?
8. Are your gums puffy, red or swollen looking?  Do they bleed easily?
9. Do you have old fillings or dental work that makes you less confident about your smile &/or appearance?
10.  What would you most like to change about the appearance of your teeth?
11.  How would you like your teeth to look?

If you like, we can review your responses with you and discuss alternatives to achieve a more pleasing smile.

For more information about our cosmetic treatments and procedures and other dental topics please visit our website www.TavorminaDentistry.com 

More About Avulsed Teeth

When a patient presents with an avulsed tooth, now the task for dentists is much more complicated because there are eight different clinical categories in which an avulsed tooth may present to a dentist.  Each of these requires a separate treatment regimen.  Dentists are not taught this in school, and they have to learn a new technique.

It is clear that there are four equally important aspects that dentists need to institute in order to maximize the success rate of reimplanted avulsed teeth.

1. Educate the general population that avulsed teeth can be saved.
2. Recommend to patients and the general population that they should be prepared for this type of accident by having suitable optimal storage devices like Save-A-Tooth and emt TOOTHSAVER readily available where accidents can occur.
3. Dentists should diagnose the condition of each avulsed tooth and use the most compatible technique for treating avulsed teeth in their offices.
4. The reimplanting professional must recommend that root canal therapy be instituted at the appropriate time after reimplantation.

Dentistry has to advise the general population, schools, athletic teams, and dentists to be prepared for this type of accident.

For information about other dental topics visit www.TavorminaDentistry.com

What Do I Do If My Tooth Gets Knocked Out?

Research and clinical studies have shown that a tooth that has gotten knocked out (an avulsed tooth) can be successfully put back in the socket (reimplanted) with excellent long-term results.  However, this success can only be realized if new treatment regimens are applied. 

There are eight categories of avulsed teeth and treatment guidelines for each one of them.  The first four categories involve mature teeth that have fully developed roots and fully formed root tips.  The next four categories are for teeth that are immature and are not fully developed and have root tips that are incompletely formed. 

Thirty years ago, the recommendations to patients for the management of avulsed teeth was a simple, “one-size-fits-all approach: retrieve the teeth, wash them off, and push them back into their sockets.  If that is not possible, the patient should drop them in a cup of milk and get to the dentist as quickly as possible.

For dentists, too, 30 years ago it was just as much a one-size-fits-all approach: remove teeth from the transportation device, do the root canal therapy in their hand, reimplant the teeth and splint them into place, prepare the patient’s parents for eventual failure and hope that the subsequent root resorption would leave the crown of the tooth in place until the patient was 18.

For patients, the only liquid that has clearly shown beneficial effects preserving the root cells is a pH-balanced solution.  There are two products available on the market for parents and sports teams to have on hand in case of an accident: Save-A-Tooth and emt TOOTHSAVER.  Significant success rates of reimplanted avulsed teeth can be achieved if they are placed within 60 minutes of the accident and stored in either of these products before visiting the dentist.

For information about other dental topics visit www.TavorminaDentistry.com

Who Needs A Beautiful Smile?

Perhaps a beautiful smile isn’t important to everyone, but you would be surprised at the difference a beautiful smile can make in someone’s life. 

When people are aware that they have a less than attractive smile, it affects their entire personality – how they speak with people, how much they smile, how they laugh, how they socialize.  Being unhappy with your smile makes your confidence level low and it really inhibits smiling and laughing.  When you smile and laugh your body actually produces feel good chemicals.  When you are self-conscious about your smile and either hold it back or cover your mouth when you smile or laugh, you don’t have the benefit of the feel good response that smiling and laughing produce.

So even for people whose work doesn’t involve business contacts &/or public speaking, low self-confidence affects their mood and performance.  For people whose work involves a lot of  people contact or public speaking, it is vital that they put their best foot forward and the best foot forward approach starts with a beautiful, open, confident smile.

A beautiful smile is a primary factor that helps people feel young and attractive.  As we age it is natural for teeth to get darker in color and get worn down.  When an older smile gets a makeover, it’s better than most any plastic surgery procedure to make someone look years younger and give renewed confidence in smiling, laughing, and living again!

For information about other dental topics and ways to beautify your smile visit our website: http://www.tavorminadentistry.com