One of the best parts of our job as dental health practitioners is when we get to celebrate our patients’ gorgeous new smiles. We’ve seen first-hand so many times how life changing the right dental care can be. Today, we want to take a minute to show you one of our recent smile success stories!

A Dream Smile That Started with a Nightmare

A 70-year-old female patient came to us after 20 years struggling with old crowns that didn’t meet up properly. Her crowns were worn down, chipped, and discolored. Because they didn’t fit together properly, her teeth didn’t have a stable place to rest. They often slid against each other, making her bite her cheeks and lips frequently and making it hard to eat.

Even worse, her unstable bite had put constant strain on her jaw joints for years, leaving her with chronic TMJ problems and pain. The constant pain and non-functional bite made it hard to eat and limited her food choices, especially affecting her in social situations.

She needed a way to make her teeth more functional and relieve the stress on her jaw while giving her a gorgeous, refreshed smile she could feel great about.

That’s where we come in.

Step 1: Planning Perfection

Lake Baldwin Dental uses cutting-edge digital diagnostics for every patient to ensure we’re always providing the most precise care possible. Especially when we’re rebuilding someone’s smile, we don’t want to leave anything to chance.

We built a highly accurate 3D digital model using a combination of digital x-rays and scans, which served as the scaffolding to design our patient’s new smile.

Did you know you don’t have to bite into those uncomfortable trays of goop to make models anymore? With our Trios 3D dental scanner, we run a specialized camera over all the surfaces of your teeth and gums. Those hundreds of images get assembled into a digital model which we can then print on a 3D dental printer.

This approach lets us fix any errors in the moment and ensures a much more precise model. It also captures the exact shade of your teeth and gums, which we can use to make sure your new smile looks as natural as possible.

Step 2: Undoing the Damage

Dr. Dunn removed our patient’s old, failing crowns and stabilized the teeth underneath. After Dr. Dunn adjusted the teeth to create a perfect fit for the new crowns, intrepid dental assistant Allison took another set of images and scans of the adjusted teeth.

Temporary crowns are a necessary evil to get the best outcomes. Allison, is a pro at crafting gorgeous temporaries our patients feel good about while they’re waiting for their final restorations.

However, this case was especially tricky because we needed to rebuild the patient’s bite! After twenty years of wear on her old crowns, her jaw had gotten used to a collapsed bite that let her close too far. Part of the process of rebuilding her healthy bite meant calculating the ideal closing position for her jaw and building restorations that would give her the stability and support of a healthy bite.

It took a few weeks for her to adjust to her new bite so that we could move forward with placing her final restorations. While her temporaries looked great, they’re not the most comfortable over a long time, and this was the major challenge Dr. Dunn had to overcome in this case.

Step 3: Celebrating a Renewed Smile!

We started this process with the goal of rebuilding our patient’s smile in time for a month-long family vacation, which gave us about six weeks from start to finish. Because we had to allow enough time for her to adjust to her new bite, it was a tight timeline!

Fortunately, our team is always up for a challenge! We delivered her gorgeous new smile in time for her to enjoy a month-long family vacation in comfort. She was ecstatic with the final product and got instant relief from her chronic jaw pain and was no longer accidentally biting herself because of her teeth sliding.

Some older dental materials can irritate the gum tissue. Bite disharmony can also increase gum inflammation and put strain on your periodontal health. Rebuilding our patient’s smile also improved her gum health, reversing the inflammation in her gums and turning them from red and irritated to healthy and pink. Healthy gums are an important part of a beautiful smile as well as your health!

She loves the natural, soft, youthful appearance of her renewed smile and was able to smile with confidence for photos with her loved ones on their trip.

To make sure she enjoys her dream smile in comfort for as long as possible, we crafted a night guard to protect her restorations while she sleeps. With good home care habits and regular dental cleanings, she should enjoy great dental health for years to come!

You Could Be a Smile Success Story, Too!

We’re so grateful for our patients’ trust in us. We know how discouraging dental health problems can be and how hard it can be to put your faith in someone when it comes to your smile.

If you’re struggling with failing dental work, missing teeth, chronic decay, severe wear or any other problems that are compromising the look or function of your teeth, we’re here for you.

Call us to schedule a consultation for cosmetic dentistry in Orlando, FL so we can explore your options and work together to create a treatment plan to give you a smile you’ll love for life! Keep smiling with confidence, Orlando!