If you’ve suffered from a crooked smile since childhood, you’re not alone.
From cross bites and crowded teeth to underbites and gapped teeth, malocclusions are a common dental problem that can create embarrassment, self-consciousness and inconvenience.
Perhaps you’ve always wanted to straighten your teeth, but you weren’t ready to accept the common solution for fixing your malocclusion: metal braces.
While metal braces are common, they involve a number of complications, complications that can make you reconsider your dream of a straight smile, especially if you’re an adult.
In this article, we’ll consider some common drawbacks for braces and why they aren’t your only option for achieving beautifully aligned teeth.
The Complications of Metal Braces for Adults
If you want to straighten your teeth with metal braces (also known as fixed orthodontic appliances), you’ll find there are a number of drawbacks during treatment. Some of these drawbacks may seem trivial when you’re only in your teens. However, as you get older, a minor inconvenience can turn into a major roadblock between you and orthodontic treatment.
Here are a few problems you can experience if you choose fixed orthodontic appliances...
- Inconvenience. With traditional braces, your path to a straight smile is hardly an easy one. In addition to spending a large amount of time cleaning your teeth, you’ll also need to alter your diet until you’ve completed your treatment, avoiding foods that can damage your braces.
- Embarrassment. This is perhaps one of the greatest drawbacks for wearing metal braces as an adult. For a number of months, if not years, you can experience self-consciousness because you’re acutely aware that people may be looking at the metal brackets and wiring affixed to your smile.
- Dental problems. It’s no secret that wearing braces can make it easier to experience demineralisation and tooth decay, dental problems that can mar your smile once you’ve finished straightening your teeth.
Complications like these can make you hesitant to choose fixed orthodontic appliances. However, there’s no need to give up your dream of a beautiful smile simply because you don’t want metal braces.
Keep on reading to discover how you can achieve a straight smile without settling for fixed orthodontic appliances…
How to Straighten Your Teeth without Metal Braces
Whether you have a minor malocclusion or very crooked teeth, you’ll be happy to know that you can straighten your teeth without metal braces.
The solution is Invisalign.
Invisalign is an orthodontic treatment utilising a series of clear aligners that allows you to avoid the brackets, archwires and rubber bands associated with fixed orthodontic appliances.
Like traditional braces, Invisalign will gradually align your teeth over the course of time, week by week. However, the way your aligners correct your smile is vastly different from what you’ll experience with metal braces.
Here’s what you need to know...
The Invisalign Treatment Process
The secret to Invisalign’s effectiveness is a clear plastic material called SmartTrack®. While this material is strong enough to straighten your teeth, it’s also nearly invisible, allowing you to conceal your orthodontic treatment.
As Invisalign explains, your practitioner may use an iTero® scanner to take 3D digital images of your teeth. These images then become the basis of your customised aligners, designed from the SmartTrack® material.
Your visits to your orthodontist will also look quite different from what you’d experience with metal braces. Instead of undergoing adjustments, you’ll simply wear a new set of aligners each week.
Yet most importantly, Invisalign aligners allow you to enjoy…
- Convenience. Unlike metal braces, you can remove your aligners to eat all your favorite foods without any worries about damaging your braces.
- Confidence. Your aligners’ clear plastic material is discreet and practically unnoticeable, empowering you to laugh and smile without embarrassment.
- Healthy teeth. Because your aligners can pop out, you’ll ensure proper oral hygiene to protect your teeth during your treatment.
With advantages like these, there’s no reason to delay a beautiful smile when you can straighten your teeth without the complications of metal braces.
To experience Invisalign’s superior treatment process, schedule your free consultation at your local MiSmile Invisalign provider.
