What is SmileFast?

Overview, SmileFast & Composite Bonding

Have you heard of composite bonding yet? If you’ve not, it’s basically where dentists are using white filling material to add to patients’ teeth in order to improve their smiles. Sometimes to achieve the best results, dentists are spending many hours doing this by a free-hand technique which can be a little daunting to the patient and dentist. SmileFast aims to make the whole process much simpler, more predictable and less time consuming for both you and the dentist. How do they do this, let’s find out by seeing what the current challenges are…

Current Challenges of Composite Bonding

Before we decide to go ahead with our composite bonding, how do we know that our patient will like the finished results? Well, in all honesty, it’s difficult. If patients’ budgets are limited, I will sometimes just listen to my patient and what they want me to address, and fortunately the patients are very trusting. If patients want to see largely how the treatment would look, we sometimes ask the dental laboratory to provide us with a mock-up for the patient to try in. The only problem here is that the dentist can never truly replicate the mock-up and so we explain that it is just a guide. Essentially the patient and dentist are both hoping that they will each be happy with the results, we only really know once you look in the mirror. 

The other challenge is that the treatment can often take a long time and significant skill to complete. Only by honing years of skill and continued learning can dentists more predictably get the best results. I personally enjoy doing this freehand and will likely continue to do so for some cases. Let’s look next at how SmileFast makes both our lives easier when it comes to composite bonding…

How does SmileFast improve treatment

The SmileFast system offers the ability to have a ‘Smile Design’ and ‘Smile Reveal’ stage. Both of these stages make giving our patients are real idea of what we can achieve for them much more reliable. I listen to what a patient wants to improve and how they would like their teeth to look. I then take photos and impressions which we then send to the SmileFast laboratory. This is the clever bit, they then use their patented CAD-CAM technology to digitally design your smile following my instructions. I can send you an email of the photo of the smile design before we next see you for your Smile Reveal. 

At the Smile Reveal visit, the SmileFast laboratory have sent me a template to try the smile design in for you. This way, you can see exactly what we are working towards. The cost for this initial stage is typically £100. We keep the price low so as just to cover our basic overheads and allow patients to see what we can achieve for them. 

At this point, we can discuss with you what your thoughts are and if you want any adjustments. Once you are happy, we then instruct the laboratory to make the SmileFast guide. At this appointment, the composite is inserted into the guide and then bonded to the teeth. This process can be done in minutes, the dentist will then spend some time polishing the composite and completing any refinements necessary to the bite.

The Author’s View on SmileFast

Composite bonding and the SmileFast system, are two aspects of dentistry that I really believe dentists should be utilising more. Composite is such a versatile material and if your dentist becomes adept in using this to a high standard, we are able to improve smiles for our patients in a much kinder way. 

If any of the material does chip and need repairing, often, this is relatively straight forward because we can simply add to the existing work. This means that neither the patient or dentist need worry if these situations arise.

I personally had the SmileFast system myself in September 2020. I hope that gives confidence to my patients knowing that this is something that I would advocate on my own teeth. Nothing lasts forever in dentistry. I will need the treatment to be polished and maintained in the medium term. In the longer term, there is nothing to mean that I cannot simply redo the same treatment again when necessary. My teeth are still the same underneath the composite. It is a much kinder option to the teeth because we are not removing any tooth structure in my case, as in most cases.

Often, I will not use composite bonding alone to give patients the smile that they are aiming for. I will in most cases also whiten the teeth before and after we add the composite. In some cases, I will discuss the option to align the teeth first also. 

If you want to know more then you are welcome to get in touch via Facebook, or to book in for a consultation and we can discuss what your options are. Thanks for reading!