Episode 4 - Teeth Straightening with Invisalign Clear Aligners

Dr. Michelle discusses how Invisalign clear aligners are used to straighten teeth discreetly and effectively. Learn more at https://jacksonvillebeachdentist.com/services/invisalign/

Transcript

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Dr. Michelle (00:06):
Smile,

Kevin (00:07):
It's time for Dr. Michelle's smile cast where we talk about your smile and other interesting dental topics.

Dr. Michelle (00:16):
Smile

Kevin (00:17):
And now here's Dr. Michelle DeFelice, Hucke of Jax Beaches Family Dentistry. Smile.

Kevin (00:24):
You have a pretty smile, right?

Dr. Michelle (00:27):
Thank you.

Kevin (00:28):
You ever used Invisalign? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Huh, absolutely. So we see the TV commercials all over the place. Some pretty prominent sponsorships of various events for Invisalign, and of course you work with that and have worked with that technology for a long, long time. A lot of us that are amateurs would call it invisible braces.

Dr. Michelle (00:48):
That's a good term.

Kevin (00:49):
Is that pretty good, huh? I think that's good. That works. That works. So talk to me about how it works, I guess in context of something a lot of us would understand, a lot of our listeners would understand old school braces that you would've had slapped on your mouth back in the 1970s. Nice and metal with a little bit of headgear thrown in and got to have those rubber bands. Remember all that

Dr. Michelle (01:10):
I do. I had that also. So yeah, I've had the pleasure of experiencing both. Well, a couple of things. I mean, regular braces like my children currently have also come a really long way. Back when you and I had braces, we had an actual bracket, which was a band right around each

Kevin (01:33):
Tooth. Each tooth, yes.

Dr. Michelle (01:35):
It's hard to even fathom nowadays, and really just because of bonding technology, right, adhesive technology, they are now able to just adhere the bracket itself that holds the wire on the tooth directly to the tooth. So there's no need for bands on every tooth anymore. So that has really changed braces in general.

Kevin (02:03):
So to back up a little bit, what sort of damage did that do to us children of the seventies?

Dr. Michelle (02:07):
Well, the bad thing about a bracket on every tooth was decay. If the cement washes out at all on an actual band, then you can get decay up underneath it, and it's also makes it harder to actually close the spaces in between each tooth because you have a band around every tooth. So yeah, then new braces are much more comfortable, much less invasive, much more effective.

Kevin (02:35):
So jumping back to Invisalign, which of course they have at Jax Beaches Family Dentistry, you can learn more by going to Jacksonvillebeachdentist.com. We're going to put all this information upon Facebook as well, but Invisalign seems to be a really good option for people of adult status.

Dr. Michelle (02:53):
Yeah, adults, most adults are not gleeful about the idea of having their teeth straightened at all to begin with, and if they're debating getting their teeth straightened, they certainly are not thrilled about the idea of regular brackets with wires and metal. And so the advantage of Invisalign is that it's an aligner, so it's a clear aligner. It looks and feels a little bit similar to a bleaching tray. If you've had one of those made, obviously it's way different than a bleaching tray. It's a little bit more rigid and it's custom designed to your mouth, usually from a scan, but sometimes from an impression, it's made robotically, believe it or not, in a factory, and it's all done through cad cam from one scan or one impression. The whole setup is done electronically of what each individual movement is going to look like of your teeth from start to finish, and then an aligner is made for each one of those movements.

(04:01):
So it's really, I took the class, I don't even know how long ago now, maybe 15 years ago under dress because I had an associate dentist that had been doing it, and he moved on and bought his own practice. And so I had all these patients that I had to finish and figure out how to treat. So I was like, oh my gosh, I never in my life wanted to move teeth, but I just loved, I fell in love with it. I fell in love with the technology and just fell in love with the whole process. So it's really very impressive technology. They've been a great company since their patent wore off or whatever. There's other companies competing in the market, and a lot of 'em, the fees are a lot less, but I've just enjoyed working with Invisalign.

Kevin (04:51):
Yeah. We're talking about Invisalign a way to, of course, give you a prettier smile, I guess, in a way, right? Guys and gals can benefit from this.

Dr. Michelle (05:01):
Absolutely. Right? Yeah. I mean, a lot of times it's for aesthetics, but straighter teeth are healthier too. So a lot of times I'm bringing it up to people because I'm concerned about the long-term health of their teeth. Also,

Kevin (05:17):
Typically when they start the Invisalign process, it's going to take how long before they have this beautiful smile.

Dr. Michelle (05:23):
It really varies. Some people are straightening teeth to the naked eye, already look straight. So that's a much shorter timeframe. And that's the other thing that's nice about Invisalign. You're not having to put all these brackets on and have all this infrastructure for minor movement. So it's really nice for people that just have minor movement that they need to do. However, Invisalign has evolved to the point where some pretty major movements and pretty complicated cases can be done. So it varies from as short of a couple of months to as long as a year or a year and a half, similar to traditional orthodontics.

Kevin (06:03):
Right. Well, once again, if you have any questions at all, you can learn more by going to Jax Beaches Family Dentistry. That's jacksonvillebeachdentist.com. And also check them out on Facebook and Instagram. The telephone number here locally, two four seven zero one one one. That number again, 2 4 7 0 1 1 1. We're going to come back and spend some more time with Dr. Michelle, so stay tuned. God love any band with a horn section. Right, Dr. Michelle?

Dr. Michelle (06:44):
Absolutely. I love the saxophone.

Kevin (06:46):
Yeah. Have you ever seen Chicago in concert?

Dr. Michelle (06:48):
No. Really?

Kevin (06:49):
I'm surprised by that. You've seen Jimmy Buffet 5,000 times

Dr. Michelle (06:53):
In concert

Kevin (06:54):
And the Eagles.

Dr. Michelle (06:56):
Yes. Last time I went to a Buffet concert, turns out it was really an Eagles concert. That's right. Buffet

Kevin (07:01):
Was just the opening act. It was super

Dr. Michelle (07:03):
Good. Yeah, he only played for like 30, 40 minutes. It was funny. I mean, it was fine for me ultimately, but I'm sure some Buffett fans were like, what the heck just happened? I got

Kevin (07:14):
Shortchanged, Dr. Michelle DeFelice is with us, and of course, she is the owner of Jax Beaches Family Dentistry and lives with us here in St. John's County. You can learn more by going to jacksonvillebeachdentist.com. Also, check us out on Facebook. We're going to go on Facebook live here in just a moment. In case you've always wondered, what does Dr. Michelle look like?

Dr. Michelle (07:36):
I have had people come in as new patients that either only have seen the or billboard or only heard me on the radio, and they just sort of look at you like, that wasn't what I was expecting.

Kevin (07:50):
Yeah. But they're fine. They're happy with it as opposed to me. They're always greatly disappointed. Oh, stop. They always think it's supposed to look like James Earl Jones or something because the voice doesn't fit the body. Dr. Michelle is with us today. We wanted to talk a little bit about options for getting you a great smile. Of course, there's a lot of different options. A lot of you may be dealing with issues if your teeth not being as straight as you would like. And I guess we have some listeners out there who are in their fifties and sixties saying, ah, that ship sailed, but it really hasn't.

Dr. Michelle (08:22):
Right? No. In fact, pretty much the first thing patients will say to me that are of a certain age is, oh my gosh, I just dunno if I want to go through all this at my age. And for me, it's often we're debating it because maybe they don't love the way that crowded teeth appear. So it's like an aesthetic thing if you're 50 or 60 years old. The other reason if aesthetics isn't enough of a motivation is that straighter teeth are healthier. So the problem with crowding long-term is that it crowds out the bone that's supporting your teeth. It can create recession of the teeth as the teeth move outside of the bone, and that puts you at risk for losing and it's losing teeth, and it's usually your lower front teeth that become more and more crowded over time. Once your teeth are crowded, it's always going to progress because crowded teeth aren't stable, and we don't ever want the teeth to get pushed out of the bone.

(09:31):
So if you have, for example, a tooth on the bottom that's ahead of the wrist of your teeth, that means it's being pushed out towards your lip, which is out of the bone. And that's why all of a sudden, in some cases, you'll notice, Ooh, my recession on that one tooth on the bottom front has gotten worse. And really that's a concern, obviously, not necessarily aesthetically, but it's a concern for the health of your teeth. And crowded teeth are harder to keep clean. We all have a tendency to build up tartar. That's the harder and to plaque on our lower front teeth. And it just is worse if the teeth are crowded. It makes it harder to get the floss in there. It makes it harder to keep the bacteria out of the nooks and crannies of the teeth that are crisscrossed over each other. And so straightening teeth is always, people are always going to be primarily motivated to do it because of aesthetics, but really from a dental standpoint, we obviously are motivated to keep your teeth healthy too.

Kevin (10:37):
Yeah. That's Dr. Michelle once again. If you have any questions, you can always reach her office at 2 4 7 0 1 1 1, 2 4 7 0 1 1 1. If you have any questions about straightening your teeth, Invisalign is what we're talking about. And of course there are different options. There are different versions of Invisalign, but it's been your professional experience that Invisalign, they're the best at what they do.

Dr. Michelle (10:59):
Yeah, they're a great company. I've enjoyed working with them. There are all kinds of different aligner companies though, so we tend to use Invisalign, but the experience from a patient standpoint is the same. The one thing I would not recommend is using aligners where you do it, your selfie at home.

Kevin (11:22):
Oh, I've seen those on TV late at

Dr. Michelle (11:24):
Night. Yeah. There's a lot of different concerns with that. One of them is obviously that you're not seeing a dentist every three to six weeks, and so your teeth can end up getting in positions that aren't healthy for them. That's a concern. If it's not being supervised by a dentist, you don't know that you're not moving teeth that have issues like gum disease or other things. So it's very dangerous to move your teeth on your own if you haven't had a dental and exam and cleaning. So if you're listening to me and you do not have a regular dentist, please do not straighten your teeth at home. Yeah, super, super dangerous for the health of your teeth.

Kevin (12:06):
Yeah, it's kind of like changing your own oil. Just don't do it people.

Dr. Michelle (12:10):
Yeah. There are just all kinds of attachments and things that we have to do to your teeth at the dental office by a dentist in order to have those straightening go. Well,

Kevin (12:22):
Alright, tell you what, we're going to play a song or two. We're going to come back and wrap things up with Dr. Michelle in the meantime. Check us out on Facebook. We're going to go on Facebook live here in just a moment, and you can always connect with 'em too by going to jacksonvillebeachdentist.com. I like that song. It's such a happy song. Gallery from 1972. It's so nice to be with you, Dr. Michelle.

Dr. Michelle (12:56):
Thank you.

Kevin (12:57):
Yes. Is it nice for you to be with us?

Dr. Michelle (12:59):
It is. I love being on the radio. Something I missed.

Kevin (13:03):
We're live on Facebook as well. And of course you can just go to Jax Beaches Family Dentistry on Facebook. Just search for that. Jax Beaches Family Dentistry, and then you'll get to see Dr. Michelle. We're talking about Invisalign. Maybe you have heard someone talk about it, maybe you think it might be a good option for someone in your life. We talked about how it could be really beneficial for people who are listening to us who are in their forties, fifties, and sixties and seventies, and they have teeth that need to be straightened. Right? Absolutely. What about if they're younger? I mean, is it still the best option to do what your twin girls are doing or is it better to do? What's the choice that needs to be?

Dr. Michelle (13:38):
It depends on your bite and what you're trying to accomplish, and it depends on how compliant you think your teenager is going to be. Obviously the biggest difference between braces, traditional brackets with wires and Invisalign is that Invisalign is in fact removable. So the problem with that, so that's a good thing and a bad thing. You can remove it if you're giving a speech or you're going to an event and then you don't have it in your mouth. So that's an advantage. The disadvantage of something being removable is that it's removable and it doesn't work when it's removed, so they only straighten your teeth when they're in your mouth. They don't straighten your teeth when they're in their case. So if you have a noncompliant teenager, that's a problem, then the teeth don't get straightened

Kevin (14:32):
Or they take it out. Or even if you're not a teenager, you could be somebody else and you say, well, I'll make up for that time down the road. You start playing that game, right? Yes.

Dr. Michelle (14:40):
It's not a good game

Kevin (14:41):
To play. And then at the end of the month and the next time you see Dr. Michelle, in reality, you haven't put them in as long as you should have,

Dr. Michelle (14:47):
And that creates a lot of problems. So you do need to have a come to Jesus moment sort of with yourself or with your teenager or whoever is going to be doing it because it really sets us back and causes a lot of extra time and distress if they don't get worn. So I mean, a lot of times I'll be talking to people about the possibility of Invisalign and they're like, I'm probably just going to be a little non-compliant with that. That's good. Yeah. Then they regular. Yeah. Do regular braces.

Kevin (15:17):
Well, you've got some options and we'd like for you to explore those options. Dr. Michelle enjoys explaining these sorts of things, and we will like to do that for you individually, situation's different.

Dr. Michelle (15:29):
Absolutely.

Kevin (15:29):
Yeah. So get the advice and the recommendation for straightening your teeth that applies to your specific situation. This can be done affordably, right?

Dr. Michelle (15:40):
It is very affordable. Invisalign, because they've been around for a long time. They have a lot of relationships with lending institutions like CareCredit, which a lot of people are used to dealing with CareCredit often. If you're going to do regular dentistry like crowns and veneers or whatever, then with CareCredit, a lot of times you can do 12 months no interest. Invisalign has a relationship with CareCredit, and CareCredit allows that to be extended to two years no interest, which is a really good benefit, and it allows people to straighten their teeth affordably because the monthly amount that you're paying comes way down. So yeah, it's a really great option. And your monthly payments can be very affordable.

Kevin (16:32):
Make an investment in yourself, right?

Dr. Michelle (16:35):
Yeah. People are just happier with their teeth when they're straighter. We can bleach them right in the Invisalign tray itself. So immediately your teeth are straighter and whiter and you're more confident and you smile more. And it makes a big difference in people's lives. They start to dress differently and get different glasses and it's amazing.

Kevin (16:57):
Yeah. Ding, ding, ding. That's the magic word, right? Absolutely. Which is important at any stage of life. And we've talked before, but there's all sorts of data out there that says when you first meet somebody, or at any point in your life, day to day, they look at your teeth, your smile first, and they look at your eyes. It's like a split second thing. Yeah, absolutely. And then they'll start looking at your hair, and really by the time they get to your sneakers, it really doesn't matter. They've pretty much sized you up. Right? So why do you spend all that money on your sneakers? Because

Dr. Michelle (17:30):
Just fix your teeth.

Kevin (17:30):
Yeah. Fix your teeth, get your eyes. Okay. And you're good to go. So anyway, Dr. Michelle obviously is a good sport and we appreciate her taking time out of her busy schedule to be with us, and we encourage you to learn more by going to the website. On the website you'll hear some previous podcasts that we've done. There's also a lot of information. She puts a lot of content out there about all sorts of different dental health issues, and of course, they're a complete health practice, so they're concerned about your overall health. And if you decide to become a new patient there, you're going to experience that firsthand, right? Absolutely. Dr. Michelle's also my dentist, which she doesn't really proudly state to everybody, but we're going to zoom in on your teeth and Yeah, see my teeth. My teeth are straight. Yes, they are. Yeah.

(18:14):
See, thank you. But I still need some more work done, but once again, go to the website. What is that website again? St augustine dentist.com. No, it's not. It's Jack's beaches. I just said the wrong one. Yeah, we don't want 'em going there. No, that would be a mistake. Jacksonvillebeachdentist.com. Well, I'm in St. Augustine, so I'm confused. Yes. Two four seven zero one one one is the phone number. I wonder who's going to answer the phone today? Brittany. Usually. Brittany. Yeah. Brittany's so nice. She's getting ready to be a mom, so it'll be nice to her. But call Brittany (904) 247-0111. Dr. Michelle, thanks for coming by.