A Porcelain Veneer is made from special clay that is hard wearing, and easy to work with for an orthodontist and dentist. A south east dentist says that it is a fabulous tool for a dentist to work with, and a great aid for patients with a dental problem that needs covering over. Like a furniture veneer a dental veneer is used to create a top coat and cover an inferior surface below it. If you have a misaligned, chipped, cracked or discoloured tooth then a Porcelain Veneer is probably what you need, as all these problems will need a cosmetic covering after work is carried out to fix many of them. Taking digital pictures your dentist will then scan them into a computer for a technician to design the veneer prior to making them. Once they are made the dentist will be ready to fit them, first they will plane the tooth of enough enamel to allow them to fit the veneer so it blends in and looks natural. The enamel will never grow back, so when the veneer comes to the end of its life cycle it will need to be replaced with another one. They last anywhere between 5-15 years depending on how well you look after them, they usually discolour at the end and that`s when they need changing. You need to treat them just like a natural tooth, and clean them in the same way as your other teeth. Brushing, flossing and avoiding staining drinks such as red wine will help keep them pristine.

A Porcelain Crown is just that, a crown, says a South East London dentist. We all associate a crown as a piece of headgear worn by a king or queen and that is exactly what a tooth crown is, a piece of head covering. That can mean a top crown that is made to replace a part of a tooth that is damaged by a crack or even worse, a chipped tooth. The advances in dentistry science have made it possible to take the top and sides off a tooth, and then simply replace the ground down part of the tooth with the crown. This method is also used to cover the front of a tooth in whole, which can also repair and hold a crack, or cover up a discoloured tooth or a chip. In a lot of cases it can also slightly reduce gaps and cover misaligned teeth. Using porcelain as a material for the crown has a lot of advantages for the technician who makes them to order. Allowing the technician to build up the thickness by layering the porcelain makes the false tooth look more realistic, it also allows the whiteness to be controlled so that it fits in with the other teeth that will lie below, and to the side of the crown. The porcelain is a clay material and when baked it sets rock hard, which makes it easy to cement onto the existing tooth and hard wearing enough to last many years, usually without any or little maintenance. The procedure is in two sittings generally; at the first the dentist prepares the tooth to take the crown, which may mean grinding and roughing the surface. Then an impression is taken and the crown made. At the second sitting the tooth is cleaned and the crown fitted in place.