Dr Mark Flynn

Does whitening really work? The proof!

There’s a lot of misleading nonsense in advertising and social media about tooth whitening, and a resulting confusion in the general public about what works and what doesn’t. The simple answer, like with most things in dentistry, is that if it’s done properly by a dentist who knows what they’re doing the results can be amazing and most people should do it.
Annoyingly, if you look even a little closely at many of the photos used to advertise whitening, you can see they’ve been Photoshopped (look out for telltale signs like much lighter gums and lips in the “after” photos or, in some cases, just a completely different set of teeth). So I’m posting these to show what really happens after a proper course of home whitening, using well designed whitening trays, the right product, and an appropriate regime.
The photo with the grey card is calibrated to make sure the camera hasn’t altered the brightness of the photo, and the shade tabs are the same tabs used before and after (these photos are taken with a cross-polarisation filter that removes reflections and allows you to see the real internal colours of the teeth).

This patient came to see me following an emergency appointment with a dentist after a bike accident that damaged his upper right central and lateral incisors. He had exceptionally beautiful, unworn teeth so this was a really tricky one to get right. Any imperfections were going to stand out (as can be seen from the emergency repair work on the central incisor).
He had retainers from a previous course of Invisalign so I used the retainer to help with the wax-up on a printed study model and used that as my guide for the composite bonding. I used Photoshop during the planning and finishing stages to make sure everything was as perfect as possible.

Many patients in this state come to see me asking for veneers because they think they’re a better aesthetic solution and stronger than composite bonding. A single veneer on this tooth would be even harder to get right aesthetically and, in my opinion, has no advantages over good bonding.

Bród was concerned that he didn’t show a lot of tooth when he smiled so we decided to go for no-prep veneers to give him more confidence. He says he’s never felt so good and he’s just fighting those bi***es off now.

This is a nice alignment and bonding case we did recently, avoiding damage to the teeth. The patient had a lot of crowding, a deep overbite and quite severe wear on some of his front teeth.
Orthodontic treatment was carried out by the excellent Dr Pratik Sharma first, following which I did some whitening and then composite bonding on just the front four upper and lower teeth.
With the alignment corrected, these restorations should now have an excellent prognosis.

I love the NHS. I cannot wait until everyone else is done too and we can start to forget this hellish time.

I think maybe my Irish catholic upbringing has influenced my dental philosophy.

Dead, root treated teeth sometimes becomes very darkened over time. Patients are often told that the only way to properly correct this is to crown the tooth because nothing else will work. This is not true. Internal whitening works beautifully in most cases but you have to know what you’re doing. This result was achieved in just three days.
A crown on this tooth will destroy its structural integrity and, chances are, the result won’t look anywhere near as good as this.
There was a beautiful tooth hiding here for years; it just needed to be found.

Central incisors can make or break a smile. The existing composites on these teeth had a major impact on the overall appearance. After whitening, the new composites transformed the patient’s smile. These aren’t veneers: the upper parts of the teeth are the patient’s own. When blended well, the margins between the composite and tooth should disappear.

3D scanning has revolutionised what we can do with modern dentistry. It allows us to be more conservative than with past techniques, and gives greater precision, colour matching, and many other benefits over impressions for a lot of the procedures we do.

Plus, you don’t get a mouthful of gunge!

This was a lovely case where the patient was unhappy with the appearance of her old restorations. We made some simple adjustments to her bite to improve her function, and replaced all the upper veneers and crowns.

After years of hiding them, she now proudly shows off her teeth when she smiles.