Finished a year ago, worried about teeth moving back

[andrea26]

Hello,

I finished my treatment 1 year ago. My ortho gave me 3 sets of retainers to wear 3 nights a week. So far I have been wearing only 1 of the sets as he reassured me that each set will last for a couple of years.
However, today I took some photos of myself and compared them with those a year ago and my teeth don't look as perfect. They are not bad, but they looked amazing when I finished the treatment. I feel one of my teeth has slightly moved.
So today I tried on the second retainer and it felt so tight, nothing like the one I have been wearing for the last few months. Do these retainers get loose after a while?
I am going to be wearing this one from now on but what I want to know is how long these retainers really do their job for?
I am really worried now, as I have paid huge amount of money for invisalign and I was hoping to have straight teeth for many years to come. Any advice very much appreciated.

[Fangpull]

Your removable retainers will start to 'wear out' after a few months and therefore a new retainer should be made available on a regular basis. I advise my patients to have them replaced every 3 - 4 months and also to wear them every night if possible for the rest of their lives. I will suspect that not that much movement has taken place and that the new retainers will act as 'aligners' and 'nudge' your teeth back into the original position (at the time the impressions were done for your retainers). For patients on removable replacement programs, a rubber impression can be kept is storage and new ones can be manufactured from this impression as and when this is necessary. Your dentist may charge you an additional fee to do store the impression and also for every new retainer made. You can also consider fixed retainers to eliminate the ongoing costs for removable retainers.

This approach works for my patients and everyone is happy. Protect your investment.

[bbsadmin]

Dear Fangpull,

If you are an orthodontist, you must tell us the name and location of your practice to continue posting.

Thank you,
Lynn the site owner

[andrea26]

Thank you for your reply. It's very confusing to hear 2 completely different opinions. I have read somewhere that you really need to replace your retainers every 3-4 months as they do wear out. This will obviously be very costly. Should I contact my ortho and get him to order me some more retainers ?
Thank you.

[Wireless]

I just got replacement retainers for ones that were over a year old. I was still wearing them 22 hrs / day as they were made to match my last Invisalign trays and my teeth are still moving vertically. I do have the ok to wear them only at night now (at last!!)

The new retainers are extremely tight and it takes an appliance tool to get them out. They are the Essix type. I was told they would loosen up over several weeks. It's been a week and they are still very hard to remove. I wasn't told any set schedule to replace them unless they become split or have major cracks. I don't go back to the doc again for 6 months.

My orthodontist didn't give any set schedule for replacements although the cost is $95 per set. I'm not sure in my case if any fixed solution is available or if I even want to go in this direction - I'm still getting used to again enjoying my two leisurely cups of coffee in the morning!! I'm not sure I'm ready to have anything else glued to my teeth.

[KUMonkeyMomma]

I wondered about this too. I got one set of retainers that was made by my dentist (not invisalign) as when I finished treatment I had a bunch of cosmetic stuff done - bonding, changed a filling, gingivecomy on 2 teeth, etc so there was no way my last tray would have fit until one came in from invisalign. They do trays there for teeth whitening, so they did new impressions, etc right after my cosmetic stuff was done and I got my trays the following morning (I had a late afternoon appt for the "finishing work") so I was without any trays at all for about 18 hours and the trays were definitely snug when I got them but loosened back up fairly quickly (like when you first put an invisalign tray in after a meal the first few days type of thing).

My trays are considerably thicker than my invisalign trays were but I'm sure that is the case with all clear alinger type retainers so that they last a bit longer. I'm not sure if this will make them last longer or not, but so far when I put them in each night, they are snug (not painful, just snug) and then by morning they're back to being looser (again like the first few days of new trays). So I'm sure for now they are still working to move my teeth back in place from whatever movement they have during the day.

I did not ask him how much he charges for new trays and he didn't give a replacement schedule just to call him if they break or that we'll redo them whenever I get dental work done that causes them not to fit properly, etc.