Advances in Dental Care

Has time gotten away from you? Has it been a while since you’ve been in to see Dr.Shlafer? If so, be prepared to discover a lot of new options to keep your teeth healthy and beautiful. Here are a few of the newer dental care procedures and techniques:

• Improving dental health: How high-tech x-rays can help. For the last several years digitized x-rays have replaced traditional radiographs in our office. Digital x-rays are faster and more efficient. First an electronic sensor is place in the patient’s mouth to capture the image, that image is then relayed to our computer for viewing. Dr.Shlafer can store the digital images and compare them with previous images to see if there are any changes.
• CEREC–CAD/CAM technology stands for “computer assisted design/computer assisted manufactured” Together, with Dr.Shlafer’s expertise, this translates into an opportunity to have a porcelain crown or inlay fabricated and completed in one visit. This eliminates the impression we all enjoy, wearing a temporary for 2 weeks, and returning for a second visit.
• Better Bonding and filling materials–If you have chipped a tooth, you can have it fixed to look extremely natural thanks to improvements in bonding material and techniques. Today’s bonding material is a resin, which is shinier and longer lasting than substances used in the past. There is also a wider range of shades available that can be better blended to match your tooth’s natural color. This resin material can also be used in place of amalgam fillings on back teeth to give the tooth a more natural appearance. More on new technology tomorrow.

Cosmetic dentistry offers many options for people that are unhappy with their smiles. If you are one of those people, read on.

• CEREC®: Cerec is a revolutionary way to restore damaged teeth in a single visit. With CEREC® there is no need for Dr. Shlafer to take impressions, no temporary crown, no lab involvement, no return visit for the patient. This restorations is natural looking because it is made of a tooth colored ceramic material. It is metal free–no silver or metal to discolor your smile! This technique allows Dr.Shlafer to be extremely precise and save as much of your tooth as possible
• Dental Implants: Dental implants are artificial tooth root replacements that are used as part of prosthetic (crowns, bridges, dentures) dentistry in order to compensate for tooth loss. Often the result  is not only an enhanced smile, but a more youthful appearance, since missing teeth cause the face to collapse, making you look older.
• Dental Veneers: Veneers or porcelain laminates are adhesivsively bonded to the surface of a tooth to correct and repair chips and cracks. Veneers will improve discoloration by changing the shade, or gaps by reshaping and resizing the look of your tooth.
• Smile Makeover: Smile makeovers involve a comprehensive assessment of your smile  with Dr.Shlafer to determine what you would like done to improve its overall appearance. Typically one or more cosmetic dentistry procedures will be required, involving several teeth in both the upper and lower arches in order to achieve the look you want.

TOMORROW: Cosmetic dentistry questions.