Dr. Mike Malone’s Blog

I had Lumineers placed on my teeth a week ago and they look terrible. They have ridges in them and two have already broken off. My dentist is replacing them, with a tray of lumineers, which she says will be stronger because they will be in a tray. Do you have any idea what would cause the ridges? Also if I do not want her to put them on when they come in, would another Dentist possibly put them on for me since I am afraid to have her do them now.
- Pat from Mississippi

Pat,
I’m not sure I follow what you’re saying. I’m not visualizing these ridges, but apparently they make your Lumineers look ugly. Lumineers will have a slight ridge on the edge of the porcelain. Is that what has happened? Or are the ridges in the middle?

And I don’t know what a “tray of Lumineers” is. I’m imagining that she is maybe referring to a different product called Glam Smile that is put on in a tray, and I definitely don’t recommend that.

I would call everything off until you get a second opinion. If you don’t have the confidence in this dentist to have her put them on for you, you need to take a step back from this and examine all your options.

Your best bet is to get a cosmetic dentist who is accredited by the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry. That is an assurance that they know how to do beautiful work. But I don’t think there are any accredited cosmetic dentists in Mississippi. In my opinion, there are esthetic risks in going to a dentist who promotes himself or herself as a Lumineers dentist. They are promoted as being so easy that many dentists who don’t understand cosmetic dentistry are tempted to try them.

Other links:
Lumineers are just a particular brand of ultrathin porcelain veneers.

I recently got Lumineers and, while I like how they look, I am having problems speaking. My lip keeps getting caught on the Lumineers. What can be done to fix this?
- Joy

Joy,
This is one of the problems with the technique that is promoted for doing Lumineers. It sounds wonderful to be able to bond on a new smile with no anesthetic and no shaving of the teeth before the porcelain veneers are put on. But then people get these problems.

When Lumineers are placed on the teeth without first shaving the teeth back about half a millimeter, they will end up thickening the teeth. And even a slight thickening can make them look a little bulky and can cause problems like this with your lip. I think it would be embarrassing to have your lip keep sticking on your teeth when you talk.

You just have to decide if this is bothering you enough to want to have these re-done.

Other links:
Read another blog post about problems with Lumineers
See the home page of Lafayette dentist Dr. Mike Malone

After a 2 month long ordeal with getting my lumineers and then having them redone due to pain and the color from one Lumineer to the next being greatly different, I was flossing as directed last Friday and the top of one lumineer cracked off. Then today, having my Mother’s Day lunch, Another Lumineer cracked into four pieces! There is a jagged piece still attached. I hate Lumineers and going back every 2 weeks to get them changed or fixed or redone. Also I can’t find any info on the better business bureau.
- Vanessa in Texas

Vanessa,
There are a lot of stories going around about problems with Lumineers. But the problem really isn’t usually with the material, but usually in the placing of the Lumineers. With their heavy promotion, where they talk about how easy they are to do, they are attracting a lot of dentists who aren’t thoroughly trained in cosmetic dentistry. They dentists have been to the two-day Lumineers course, but they need several years of going to extra courses to really be good at cosmetic dentistry.

Manipulating color is where most general dentists have the most trouble. You found that when you got your first set, because you said that at first the color was different from one tooth to another. To be lifelike, the porcelain needs to have some translucency, so the color of the underlying tooth strongly affects the final color. It takes considerable training and experience to know how to manipulate this color well.

Then when they began to crack and fall off, this is most likely due to a problem in the bonding technique. Lumineers and other brands of porcelain veneers get their strength from the strength of the bond to the tooth.

My advice is to keep with this dentist until he or she gets it right. It seems like the dentist got in over his or her head. They got the advertisements from the Lumineers people that made this all seem so easy, and they’re learning the hard way that it isn’t so easy.

One of the best ways to be sure that your cosmetic dentist knows what he or she is doing is to find one who is accredited by the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry, like Dr. Malone is. It’s a three-year process to become accredited, and the dentist has to pass a stringent series of examinations, including a review of the dentist’s actual work by a panel of examiners. You can’t get through that without a thorough understanding of cosmetic dentistry.

Related information:
Read about Dr. Mike Malone and his credentials