Dr. Katie To treated a patient with an infected tooth and severe gum inflammation that required 1.5 years of bacterial-reduction therapy, crown removal, and staged healing before any cosmetic work. The infection had to be fully resolved first, so whitening and bonding were postponed until the underlying inflammation was gone.
She also had one infected tooth. We took that out, we sent it in for testing. We did all the types of treatment. She also did bacterial reduction therapy with her hygienist where they did ozone, they did laser to clear up as much as they can. But there was just so much inflammation around the gums. We had to treat all of that with removing the crowns and safely putting new restorations that were porcelain. So the turnaround, and again, this took a year and a half to finish her treatment because we had to phase it out. Her initial goal, she wanted whiter, better teeth, but there was no way that I was going to do any of that. bonding until we put out the fires, and she had so many fires to put out.
