I had dental bonding done about three weeks ago. It is already picking up stains. I have been drinking coffee, but my dentist never said anything about avoiding coffee. Is that the problem or is there something else going on?
James
Dear James,
While dental bonding does not last long, it should last much longer than three weeks. You’ll need to have someone with expertise in cosmetic dentistry examine this, but I can tell you what my suspicion is regarding what is going wrong with this.
There are a variety of fillers used in the composite used in dental bonding. These all have different properties and sizes.
Hybrid composites are stronger, but the size of their particles means they cannot be polished to a high shine. It is the polish that helps with it being stain resistant.
Microfills have extremely small particles that can be polished to a high luster that will even mimic tooth enamel. The downside to these is that they are not very strong.
There are newer nanofill composites that are saying they are a combination of both strength and polishability. Though, the jury is still out on that.
My guess is that you had your bonding done by your basic bread and butter family dentist. They will stock a general purpose composite bonding. What you need is an expert cosmetic dentist who keeps a wider variety of composites. What a skilled dentist would do in this case is to place a stronger resin on the interior, but then add the microfill on the surface in order to get that high polish. In addition to that, dentists will use a variety of shades and translucencies in order to mimic the appearance of natural teeth.
I suspect your dentist was not able to or did not know how to do those additional steps. You may want to show your dentist this post and give him or her an opportunity to repair this. If they don’t think they can do it or they are unwilling, then he should give you a refund so that you will be able to get it done by someone who can.
One other thing. Dental bonding does not whiten after it is applied. If you want whiter teeth, the time to have teeth whitening done is before the bonding is done.
This blog is brought to you by Auburn Dentists Drs. Murphree and Yount.