The Tooth Wear Consultation

Tooth wear is a complex issue in dentistry and involves normally a detailed consultation. This first consultation takes about 45-60 minutes where we determine the type of tooth wear and different causes in order to finally make a diagnosis. This diagnosis is crucial and helps us to set up a treatment plan. Only after the treatment plan can we provide you with all the possible treatment options and giving you a final estimate. The tooth wear consultations are similar to our smile consultations, but with the focus on tooth wear.

Tooth Wear History
We want to know all about your teeth and things you do on a daily basis that can lead to abnormal tooth wear. This will allow us to determine if your tooth wear originates from mechanical or chemical causes.
Typical questions include the following:
a) Do you clench or grind your teeth at night time? 
b) Do you suffer from headaches or migraines?
c) Do you drink acidic drinks on a routine basis like orange juice, soft drinks(Cola), energy drinks?
d) Do you have teeth that keep chipping or breaking?

Xrays and Scan
The necessary xrays and 360 degree panoramic scan will be taken to assist us in diagnosing your tooth wear.

Clinical findings
We look at all the teeth under magnification to identify the wear and if this correlate with what we had find in the history taking. This will further allow us to classify the type of wear. The wear lesions will typically originate form dental attrision, erosion, abfraction or abrasion.

Records, DSD and Photo session
2 Sets of dental impressions and a bite will be taken to allow us to manifacture mounted plaster models. These plaster models will set the tone for the diagnosis and treatment planning.
A photo session (16 photos) will follow to aid in digital smile design(DSD) to help us further in diagnosing and planning your new smile.

Diagnosis
An initial provisional diagnosis can be made, but only after taking all the relevant information into consideration can we come up with a final diagnosis and possible treatment plan. This will all happen after the appointment and we usually take a few days to finalise the treatment plan. If necessary we consult with our dental technicians and specialists to make use of a team approach and finalise the case.

Estimate
An estimate will be send to you after a few days and you then need to come back for a final discussion. We will then provide you with all the possible options to see how we can make this work for you.