Journey to the perfect smile – Dr. Adyan

This is a story of a memorable patient’s journey to a beautiful smile – it’s longer than any other posts I’ve written before, but it’s worth a read if you’re interested on how we made her smile more beautiful, and how it may help you to achieve one too.

The first time I met her, she brought her daughter along for an extraction. And when it was her turn, I checked her records and noted that she previously came for a consultation.

She admitted that although she came here some time ago, she was too afraid to do dental procedures so she never came back after that.

But now, she had gathered her courage to finally sit on the dental chair!

Just for that, I applauded her. Trust me, I’ve met so many patients who have changed their lives just by taking one brave step to come see their dentist and get their teeth fixed, and this patient of mine was one of them.

She was determined to get her teeth fixed this time, because she had an upcoming reunion that she would be attending. She wanted to make sure she could talk and smile freely without worrying about her smile.

We sat together and talked about what bothered her. There was a long list of what she didn’t like about her teeth, some of them were – gaps between upper teeth, yellow-greyish discolouration of one front tooth, cavities with brownish discolouration on her front teeth, chipped off edge of another front tooth, and the whitish spots that were generally on her front teeth (fluorosis). Another interesting fact about her teeth was, she didn’t have any canines! The teeth that you can see in the pictures are actually her first premolars (the teeth that were supposed to be situated behind the canines).

The solution might seem simple – to cover up everything with veneers. But the discolouration of her yellow-greyish front tooth was very bad that veneers only would not give the best result. If you could notice from the pictures, there was already a veneer done on that tooth, and the patient said at that time the colour was still the same with the other teeth. But as time passed by the tooth had become more yellow-greyish.

She thought it was the veneer that changed colour. It wasn’t. Composite veneers generally don’t change colour, they could only stain over time. After examining the tooth thoroughly, I informed her that her tooth was ‘dead’ (she told me that she had hit something hard on the tooth previously).

What she needed was a root canal treatment for the discoloured (‘dead’) tooth, followed by internal bleaching of the tooth to brighten up the shade from within. Then only we’d proceed with composite veneers for all her front teeth.

After much thought and discussion, we both agreed to proceed with a single-visit root canal treatment on the front tooth followed by internal bleaching on the same day.

The tooth was monitored for about a week and a half, and the bleaching material was changed every 3-4 days.

Finally, after one and a half week, the tooth shade of the dead tooth had returned to the same shade as the other teeth. Both of us were incredibly happy to see the result of the internal bleaching!

On her appointment day to do composite veneers for her front teeth, she came in with mixed feelings that were evident on her visage: anxious, but excited at the same time.

I’ll admit, this patient’s case was a slightly challenging case for me. The gaps on her left side were a lot wider than the gaps on the right side – which made it difficult to get her teeth size just right. The alignment of her teeth was slightly crooked too.

(I apologize due to the different gadget used on the veneer appointment day, the pictures on this day appear slightly different from the pictures on the previous days. But I did take pictures of her ‘before veneers’ and ‘after veneers’ with the same gadget.)

But I always love a good challenge, and I poured all my concentration and effort to fix her teeth that day – six composite veneers to close the gaps while maintaining a balanced size and proportion of teeth, correcting the discoloured patches on her teeth, improving her teeth alignment, and making her premolars look like canines.

And at last, I let the patient see her smile in the mirror after we’re finished.

As she was admiring her new beautiful smile, I smiled along behind my mask. She looked a bit shy; she wasn’t used to seeing these new pretty teeth that were decorating her charming smile.

“You did a great job, doc,” she uttered in delight.

I shook my head and said, “If it wasn’t for you who had the courage to come and fix your teeth, none of these would have been possible.”

Now she’ll be attending her reunion with a gorgeous smile that no one would have ever expected. And I’m just genuinely happy for her.

There’s always a solution to any dental problem that you’re having, but you have to take the first step to reach out to us then only we can help you. No two patients are the same for me, I view all patients as unique and require specific treatment plans after I have met them and conducted a proper examination of their dental condition.

So don’t be afraid or shy to come see me, if you have any inquiries do write at the comments section below or you can contact me directly by writing to adyan@story.drfauziah.com

Looking forward to meet you!

Lots of love,

Dr. Adyan