FDA-approved Invisalign® is the clear aligner teeth-straightening system that revolutionized orthodontics when it was introduced to the United States in 1999. So far, more than 13 million smiles around the world have benefited from Invisalign’s discreet, nearly invisible tooth aligning system.
If you missed the teen braces train — or if you caught it, but your teeth have moved on — you may consider Invisalign to straighten (or re-straighten) your teeth. No matter what your age, straighter teeth offer many benefits, both aesthetic and medical.
At Full Circle Dental Care in Del City, Oklahoma, expert dentist Samuel Sigmon, DDS, and our entire team want you to have the healthiest, most attractive smile possible. No matter what your age, if your teeth aren’t perfectly aligned, here’s why you could benefit from Invisalign’s clear, BPA-free aligners.
One of the most important reasons to consider Invisalign as an adult — of any age — is that straightening your teeth also corrects your bite. When your teeth are out of alignment, it puts excess pressure on one side of your jaw, and also creates stress on individual teeth. Over time, that extra stress may cause your teeth to crack or chip.
When your teeth are perfectly aligned, your jawbone is too. Your teeth are designed to work like gears, grinding and tearing evenly throughout both arches. When one or more teeth are out of alignment, your gears don’t work as efficiently.
Another benefit of Invisalign is that, because you wear the aligners while you sleep, they can protect your teeth from an unconscious habit that leads to flattening, chipping, and other forms of damage: bruxism. Bruxism is nighttime teeth grinding that not only wears down and weakens your teeth but also may lead you to wake up briefly multiple times a night, interfering with sleep.
The same forces that damage your teeth when they’re misaligned are at work on your jaws as well. Over time, teeth that are out of alignment can cause jaw pain and temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorder. Misaligned jaws pop, crunch, lock, and can develop arthritis.
Crooked, gapped, or uneven teeth may make you self-conscious about your smile. Because other people feel warmed and welcomed by a brilliant smile, when you withhold it from them, you’re withholding yourself too. Others, in turn, feel your lack of confidence.
In contrast, when you smile at your coworkers and friends, they view you as more trustworthy and confident. Smiling faces are also perceived as more youthful and attractive. Smiling can even help you feel better.
Let’s face it, you have enough stress in your life. That’s why Invisalign is a perfect teeth-straightening system for adults. It only takes about 12-18 months to fix your alignment problems. That’s 50% faster than other corrective treatments that handle the same issues Invisalign does, including:
You simply wear your aligners for 22-23 hours per day, taking them out to eat and to clean them. Every week or two, you switch to a new set of aligners that ease your teeth even closer to their final goal.
You can eat food normally, brush and floss your teeth as usual, and go on with your regular life. Before you know it, you have the smile you only dreamed of before.
One of the most important attributes of Invisalign for adults is that it doesn’t fill your mouth with metal. The comfortable, nearly invisible patented SmartTrack® material that composes the aligners means you can appear in public without feeling self-conscious about straightening your teeth.
And, if you have a special event such as a wedding, photo session, or date, you can remove your aligners. (Try to do that with traditional metal braces!) Just be sure that you wear them for at least 22 hours a day.
If you had braces as a child, you probably wore a retainer for a year or two after your braces came off, and that was it. Your teeth looked perfect — for a decade, or two, or three. But almost imperceptibly, your teeth shifted out of alignment.
Invisalign circumvents that problem by recommending lifetime use of an invisible retainer. It’s made of the same SmartTrack material as your original aligners. You simply wear the retainer at night, while you sleep, to maintain your alignment for life.
Keep your teeth safe, strong, and beautifully aligned for the rest of your life by starting Invisalign today. Contact Full Circle Dental Care by phone, or schedule a consultation through our online booking system.
