“This attractive young patient, the Canadian Figure Skating Dance Junior Champion, she disliked her smile so much that she did not smile in photographs or during her performances. Orthodontics were not an option because she would not have braces and felt treatment would take too long. She was also a contestant in the Miss Hawaiian Tropic Competition.

We competed a diagnostic wax-up to reposition her cuspids and create a more harmonious smile line. The Golden Proportions were respected for the wax-up and in the final IPS Empress veneer restorations — her cuspids are now perfectly positioned. We first bleached to obtain the brightest teeth available with a Biolitec 980 laser followed by Rembrandt with a plasma arc lamp. The patient selected shade 010 from Ivoclar’s Chromascop Shade Guide for the incisals, which we transitioned to 030 at the gingival. The bleaching allowed us to use this shade, as the lower arch was shade 010! We chose a smooth surface texture similar to that of her lower natural teeth with medium translucency. Following the LVI recommendations, we made her contact points and the openings of her embrasures more gingival as we went from centrals to cuspids. The final veneers were crafted by the Advanced Esthetic (AE) Team at Aurum Ceramic/Classic and were luted with Calibra Light Translucent.

Not only did this patient finish in the top ten in the Miss Hawaiian Tropic Competition but she also underwent an instant personality transformation as soon as she saw her beautiful new smile. She is now all set to compete in the Figure Skating events at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.”

- Daniel Gallagher, D.D.S.