What are the most strongest but yet natural looking porcelain veneers that you would recommend. We have empress right now but are cracking. What questions do we ask the dentist to determine their expertise?
- Yvonne in New York
Yvonne,
Empress is an excellent, beautiful, long-lasting material for porcelain veneers. If your Empress veneers are cracking, I would guess that it’s not because of the material but because of the way it was bonded – that’s usually what makes veneers crack. But even then, the beauty and functionality only start with the material and come much more from how it is used. Would you commission a work of art based on the brand name of paint that the artist uses? Or on the type of clay he or she uses in their sculpture? Or would you tell your artist, once you have chosen them, that you want them to only use a certain brand? No – you pick the artist based on the quality of the work that you see, and you let them use the brand of materials that they are most comfortable with. And what brand of baseball glove catches balls the best? Isn’t that a lot more dependent on the player using the glove than the brand of the glove? Cosmetic dentistry is the same. The quality of the work depends on the technical ability of the dentist and on his or her artistic talent. Leave the choice of the material up to the dentist – that’s my advice. They know what works best in their hands, and every excellent cosmetic dentist has a passion for creating beautiful work that will still be beautiful five, ten, twenty years from now. They will take photos of it and show those photos to their colleagues.
And cosmetic dentistry is art. It includes expertise, but knowledge alone isn’t enough. The dentist has to be artistic in order to create a beautiful smile. You might be interested in reading an excellent post about what is a cosmetic dentist. That may get you a little more perspective on this issue.
That post comes from the website of a referral service that recommends excellent cosmetic dentists all over the country. They pick dentists based on the quality of their work and their credentials. The reason this referral service is so helpful is that there really aren’t any foolproof questions people could ask or things they could look for. In order for Dr. Rota to get listed by them, he had to disclose all his credentials and then submit a CD of detailed photographs of his cosmetic dentistry. These were examined by the trained eye of an experienced cosmetic dentist, and then they were willing to recommend him for Colorado Springs. I’d suggest checking this website for who they recommend in your part of New York.