I recently had my teeth whitened, but my dental crown, which is on one of my front teeth, didn’t get any whiter. It was already a little cloudier than my other teeth and now it is even more noticeable. What went wrong?
Melissa A. – Indiana
Melissa,
I want to make sure I’m clear on something. Did your dentist know you had a dental crown or was this a new dentist?
Teeth whitening is only effective on natural teeth. It will not whiten any kind of dental work, whether it was dental crowns or porcelain veneers. If your dentist knew you had the crown he should have told you that. To not tell you is either dishonest or incompetent.
The only way to fix this is to get a brand new dental crown. I’m guessing, because you mentioned the color was a little opaque, your dentist gave you a porcelain fused to metal crown. Those need to be made a little cloudier to mask the metal. Instead what you need, especially on a front tooth, is an all-porcelain crown.
The good thing is that you’ve already whitened your teeth, so now you can match the crown to your sparkly new color.
If your dentist knew about the crown and didn’t mention the problem, I’d have him pay for the new crown.
This blog is brought to you by Bedminster Dentist Dr. Mike Mavrostomos.