Clear aligners in Tulsa

Clear aligners straighten teeth using a series of clear removable trays instead of brackets and wires. Each tray moves the teeth a small amount, you change to the next one on schedule, and over the course of treatment the teeth arrive where they were planned to go. We use ClearCorrect.

Adult orthodontics

Most of the people who ask about aligners here are adults, and the two most common reasons are the same. Either they never had braces and have always been bothered by crowding, or they had braces as a teenager, stopped wearing the retainer, and have watched the front teeth drift back over twenty years. Both are straightforward aligner cases.

Aligners appeal to adults because they are hard to notice across a meeting table, and because they come out. You take them out to eat, so nothing is off limits, and you take them out to brush and floss normally, which matters because braces make cleaning harder at exactly the age when gum health starts to need attention.

Treated by your own dentist

The difference between this and a mail order aligner service is that someone examines your mouth before treatment starts and watches it while it happens. Teeth are moved through bone, and moving them when there is active gum disease, an untreated infection, or a failing filling causes real harm.

Dr. Hanna checks all of that first, treats what needs treating, and then plans the movement. If your case is better suited to a specialist, you will be told that rather than sold a set of trays.

What treatment involves

It starts with a consultation and records, including X-rays and a digital scan of your teeth. From the scan, the movement is planned tray by tray, and you see the projected result before agreeing to anything. Trays are worn about twenty two hours a day and changed on the schedule you are given. Check in appointments are short and confirm the teeth are tracking as planned.

How long it takes depends on how far the teeth have to move. Mild crowding or minor relapse after childhood braces is often a shorter case than a bite that needs significant correction. You will be given a realistic estimate at the consultation.

After treatment

Teeth drift for life, so treatment ends with a retainer. Wearing it is what keeps the result, and skipping it is the single most common reason people end up in aligners a second time. Fixed and removable retainers are both available here.