A patient came to see us who was unhappy with his smile. He was very conscious of a discoloured tooth at the front of his mouth and restricted his smile to not show his teeth. The tooth had slowly darkened over a period of time. He felt that if he could get this tooth looking like his other teeth it would restore his smile and his confidence when speaking to people.
On assessing the tooth, we noted that it had already been root treated and it had a very large discoloured composite white filling. The tooth had been broken in accident some years ago and the only option to save the tooth was to root treat it. This involved cleaning and disinfecting the inside of the tooth to prevent further infection and abscesses. The broken tooth had then been repaired with composite bonding.
When a tooth is root treated it becomes dry and brittle and is prone to breaking. The tooth can also discolour significantly over a period of time. In this case half the tooth had discoloured and have the tooth was a worn compsite white filling.
We discussed the options which were to either whiten the tooth and replace the old white filling with composite bonding, or place an all-ceramic crown on the tooth to mask the darker colour and help protect it from breaking in the future.
We decided to place a porcelain crown on the tooth which is an excellent choice for this situation. The tooth was prepared and impressions of the teeth were sent to the master ceramist. The ceramist then hand crafted the bespoke crown which was then cemented onto the prepared tooth. That left a very happy patient who was able to smile confidently again.
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