Metal Mouth Message Board

I recently had an apointment with a dentist here in San Diego who received an excellence award from Invisalign, and he is promising some incredible results.

He says he can straighten my teeth in 8 months with invisalign when other dentists and orthodontists were telling me it would be 18-24 months with braces or invisalign, and of course, some dentists were saying that invisalign wouldn't fix my overbite, etc...

I asked him about this, and he told me it's all about the technique. He said that Invisalign simply makes the trays to the dentist's exact specifications, and the magic actually happens with the approach the dentist takes to treatment.

Is this guy blowing smoke out his mouth, or are not all invisalign doctors created equal?

Update, I decided to go ahead and give him a try even though I'm still skeptical of the treatment time he promised. The worst I guess that can happen is it will end up taking longer... Or I'll have to go back and get regular braces when I'm done to help correct other issues, but at least I'll have a perfect smile when the invisalign is done!

I still would be curious to know what others think about doctors who receive the basic 1 day invisalign training versus ones who have several years experience and thousands of patients.

djrobsd - My dentist where I got Invisalign is in San Diego also. Maybe we have the same doc. I sent you a private message.

I would think dentists/orthodontists that have had more patients would be better. Mine takes the time to revise the Clincheck until it's the way he wants it rather than just accepting what Invisalign sends him the first time.

I am going through something similar. I saw three Orthodontists, two said that no way could Invisalign fix my problem, one who is an Invisalign premiere provider, said that unless I had jaw surgery, I could never had a text book mouth so for what he could do without the surgery it can be done with Invisalign.

I decided not to go with him and did choose the Orthodontist who has a more aggressive approach with braces. I just sort of feel like I'll always have the "what if" if I had gone with the more passive approach that the Invisalign Orthodontist had. Not saying that all Invisalign is passive, just this guy.

Anyway will be curious to see your progress!

Wow "text book mouth" is what he said huh? That sounds almost exactly like the line my orthodontist told me as well, and he's also a "Premier" provider.

I guess time will tell, I hope I don't regret my decision. I have faith that he can straighten my teeth and give me a beautiful smile, I'm just worried about my jaw and my bite, but I've never really had a problem with them, aside from a small clicking sound when I yawn, but he told me 80% of people have some sort of clicking sound when they open their jaw all the way, so maybe there is nothing to worry about there.

The amount of experience someone has certainly matters, the more people you see and the more you do a certain thing, the larger "pool" of experience you have to pull from when a situation arises. Invisalign is not a miracle appliance though, and I am a little suspicious of overblown expectations!

I don't believe all Invisalign certified dentists or orthos are created equal, no. But this is true with most things; I personally would rather go with experience than awards, but it is possible to get both, if you're lucky. I found a really informative website which talks more about this, and tons of other things. Check it out: http://mynewsmile.com/invisalign.htm. Hope your treatment goes as planned

djrobsd wrote:I recently had an apointment with a dentist here in San Diego who received an excellence award from Invisalign, and he is promising some incredible results.

He says he can straighten my teeth in 8 months with invisalign when other dentists and orthodontists were telling me it would be 18-24 months with braces or invisalign, and of course, some dentists were saying that invisalign wouldn't fix my overbite, etc...

I asked him about this, and he told me it's all about the technique. He said that Invisalign simply makes the trays to the dentist's exact specifications, and the magic actually happens with the approach the dentist takes to treatment.

Is this guy blowing smoke out his mouth, or are not all invisalign doctors created equal?

It could be the case that the original ortho is much more practised with the invisalign treatment. I think they all give the 18-24 months as an idea to cover themselves if they haven't done a huge amount of cases. I went with invisalin having been told it would be approx 18-24 months and when I received my first trays I found out i was 13/U & 11/ L which is at the outset only 6 months.