Many people think dental care only concerns oral hygiene and health, but a form of dental care called cosmetic dentistry relates more to appearance than anything else. It focuses on the aesthetics of the teeth and works to change the size, shape, and color of people's dentition. Many cosmetic dental procedures help with both the health and the look of your teeth. One specific issue for both aesthetics and oral health is a cracked tooth. Cracked teeth can create an unsightly smile and even lead to decay and deterioration issues in your mouth as well. Many cosmetic dental procedures can help with this type of common tooth damage.
Bonding, inlays and onlays, veneers, crowns, and even whitening are all cosmetic procedures that dentists commonly use to repair cracked teeth. Read on for specific details about each of these cosmetic dentistry methods and how dentists use them to restore damaged teeth.
Dental bonding, often also referred to as composite bonding, is the use of tooth-colored material on teeth to repair damage and reshape natural teeth. The material often used for dental bonding is composite resin or durable plastic in a malleable form. Dentists spread this resin in and over any cracks or chips in the tooth and then bond, or harden and cure, it in place using ultraviolet light. After the resin bonds to the tooth, dentists can clip, mold, and shine it up to resemble an original, natural tooth as much as possible. When done well, it can be nearly impossible to tell the difference between the teeth that have dental bonding work and those that do not. In addition to making a cracked tooth look and feel whole again, bonding can also help prevent bacteria from accessing the inner portions of your teeth through the crack and causing an infection.
In a similar fashion to dental bonding, inlays and onlays also help erase the appearance of cracks and prevent bacteria from entering these vulnerabilities in your enamel. Inlays and onlays are often referred to as indirect fillings. Dentists create them in a laboratory using images and impressions of your teeth that they take beforehand. Once the inlays or onlays are created, dentists will place and bond them to your teeth. Generally, inlays and onlays are placed on the top of your molar and premolar teeth. They are called inlays if they sit within the natural grooves of the biting surface or occlusal of your teeth and onlays if they cover over one or more points or cusps of a tooth. Inlays and onlays are usually made of enamel-colored resin in cosmetic dentistry, but they can also be made of porcelain or gold.
When there are many cracked teeth present or severe cracks across any of your front teeth, a cosmetic dentist might place veneers on your teeth to cover them up. Veneers are very slim covers or caps that dentists can place over the front surface of your teeth. They are meant to be a permanent solution to these problems and are nearly impossible to remove. To place veneers, dentists commonly shave down the natural enamel and then cement the veneers to this specially prepared surface. They are usually made of porcelain or composite resin to look as natural as possible as well.
Similar to veneers, crowns can also fix cracks in teeth by covering them up. The main difference is that while veneers are thin pieces that dentists place over the front portion of teeth, crowns cap over the entirety of a tooth above the gumline. Your dentist might especially suggest a crown for a cracked tooth if the crack is causing instability or separating the tooth into two or more pieces. Crowns can help keep these types of cracks from widening and maintain the integrity of your teeth. Crowns can be made of many different materials depending on the location of the tooth and the desired result. Cosmetic dentistry generally uses resin, ceramic, or porcelain fused to metal to create crowns, but crowns can be made completely of metal alloys or gold as well.
Cosmetic dentistry can be an excellent way to help eradicated cracked teeth from your mouth. Depending on which cosmetic procedures your dentist chooses to use, they can either fill in and effectively erase the cracks or simply cover them up. Talk to your dentist today about what cosmetic methods might be the right fit to keep your mouth looking and feeling good.
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