Treating Front-Tooth Black Triangles with No-Prep Veneers

Hello. I am Park Jonguk, DDS, MS of Dream Dental Clinic.

As the gums around the front teeth recede,

the space between the teeth can look dark and triangular.

Translated simply into English, this is called a black triangle.

Somehow it sounds a little more impressive in English.. haha

Anyway..

This phenomenon can be divided into several causes.

A black triangle may appear after orthodontic treatment,

it may be unavoidable because of the shape of the teeth,

or it may result as the supporting bone recedes, meaning gum changes caused by gum inflammation or aging.

These are the three categories.

When the cause is loss of supporting bone,

periodontal treatment should take priority over veneer treatment.

When it is caused by tooth shape or occurs after orthodontic treatment,

it can be treated with resin or veneers.

The problem, in principle,

is that treating a black triangle with veneers

requires substantial tooth reduction.

In certain limited cases, however, the amount of reduction can be considerably lower,

or a no-prep approach may be possible.

This requires the ability to fabricate extremely thin ceramic.

The teeth tapered toward the gums, making them prone to black triangles,

and the gums had also receded to some degree,

so black triangles were present.

There are two options to consider in this situation.

The first is to treat only the empty space with resin.

This option is helpful because it is inexpensive and can be completed immediately,

but resin as a material becomes discolored over time.

For people who drink a lot of coffee, black tea, green tea, or wine,

the discoloration occurs sooner,

so retreatment may be needed frequently.

In the case above,

it was fortunate in a way

that all the teeth were small and well aligned, with a slight inward inclination,

making no-prep veneers possible.

The question was whether ceramic could be fabricated thin enough

to wrap around the black-triangle areas.

Extremely thin ceramic was fabricated to fit precisely into those areas.

This case involved no tooth reduction at all:

a no-prep veneer case.

We tried placing the veneers one side at a time like this.

Because the teeth were small,

the veneers made the teeth larger,

improving their esthetic appearance,

and you can also see that the teeth became brighter.

Although this was a no-prep approach, you can see that the ceramic extends into

and wraps around the inner part of each black triangle.

While resolving the black triangles

with no-prep veneers,

you can also see that the tooth shapes and shades look very natural.

The translucent appearance at the tooth edges

is a characteristic of youthful teeth.

Although it is very difficult to reproduce,

it was rendered naturally.

Since 2006, Dream Dental Clinic