I have had same=day crowns before with no problems. They always matched fine. However I recently had one placed on a front tooth and something is off about it. The color is the same… sort of. It looks a bit flat and weird though. I don’t know how to quite describe it and my dentist thinks they look fine. What do I do?
Amelia
Dear Amelia,
My guess is that your dentist is a fine general dentist but does not do a lot of cosmetic dental work. Using same-day crowns are fine on teeth that aren’t front teeth. However, they don’t work as well on front teeth unless your dentist is an expert in color theory.
The reason for it is because CEREC crowns are milled from a single block of porcelain. Traditional crowns, on the other hand, are milled from several different blocks of porcelain so that they can mimic the natural changes in opacity that your teeth have.
When you are not talking about a front tooth, that is not as urgent. However, your front teeth are directly exposed to light when you smile, so then the differences become quite clear.
The only way you are going to get this particular crown to look right is to replace it. You will need an expert cosmetic dentist to do this. You’ll want someone who is AACD accredited. They can either provide you with a traditional crown or give you a new CEREC crown if that is what you want.
Don’t be surprised if even with an expert cosmetic dentist it takes a few tries to get it right. Because of that, they will need to try the crown in with a temporary try-in paste and allow you to examine the match in several different types of lighting in order to make certain that you have a perfect match. If it is not, they can redo them. This is a common procedure with a crown on a front tooth.
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