What our clients ask the most
Frequently asked questions
Clear Aligners FAQs
Clear aligners Use clear plastic trays to move your teeth a little at a time. Since the movement is computer generated, the time it takes to move the teeth is significantly reduced.
Yes. There is a Medical Release and a Dental Cavity Free Letter that needs to be signed by your Dentist before you can get your actual clear tray aligners. Both forms are located on the website underneath the Patient Resources column at the bottom of the page. Our team can also contact your local Dentist for these forms.
For minor slight movement cases, we will be able to get your teeth relatively straight in about 6 months. However, if the case requires more movement, it can take up to two years. Treatment is based on your bone formation capacity, and how much movement your teeth need in order to achieve the results you desire.
Our clear plastic trays move each of your teeth by pushing on the entire surface of the tooth, not just a small section of the tooth like traditional brackets. This process allows us more precise control and for quicker movement of your teeth to get straight in less time.
Since our product is removable, you can easily clean and floss your teeth.
Your cheeks are not scraped or scratched by metal brackets, and you do not have to use wax to cover up any sharp edges of metal or ceramic brackets.
Yes. Our clear tray is custom made to hug your teeth. During the first couple of days, the process may take some getting used to because of the different feeling of something in your mouth. Our clients say that after the first few days however, you hardly notice our Clear aligners clear trays.
The more time it has to hug and move your teeth the quicker your treatment will be. We recommend you wear your tray all day and night, and only take them out for eating, brushing, flossing and by the recommendation of your regular dentist.
For all teeth straightening processes, you have to wear a retainer in order to maintain your teeth position. You will get a set of your Retainers from our website after treatment.
There is no age limit for Clear aligners if you are in good oral and medical health. However, you must be old enough to have your permanent teeth.
To get started, it is only $49.95 for the introductory kit. You will then be charged $2,799 for the treatment cost if you choose the Full Payment Plan. We also offer a Monthly Payment Plan. If you choose the Monthly Payment Plan, you will need to pay a $699 downpayment in order to start treatment. After the down payment, your credit card will automatically be charged $170 on the first day of each month for the 20 following consecutive months. If there is a chance that the payment does not go through, there will be a $10 late fee applied. We will also allow outside financing options for special cases.
Straight teeth give our clients the added confidence in their image. Straight teeth make it easier to floss and brush because there are less food traps; therefore, causing less of a chance of cavities and periodontal disease. Straight teeth reduces stress your Temporal Mandibular Joint created by misaligned teeth. Straight teeth reduces the wear and tear of the surfaces of your teeth through grinding. Cavity detection by your dentist is easier, according to our supporting dentist.
Get the Clear aligners kit and try it out. If you are uneasy, contact us to help answer and questions or concerns you might have. If you are still unsure of the product and do not feel the trays are working for your teeth, send the kit in and we will talk to you through your patient portal before making your Clear aligners. If you are requesting a refund, you will only be charged for processing and shipping and handling fees. Refer back to the Refund Policy.
Friends and family have always told us they could not afford getting braces because of the heavy costs amounting between $3,000 and $6,000. Other customers told us they did not have the time for the monthly visits with their family’s busy schedule. We decided to take action in the form of technological innovation and processes to deliver affordable braces to our clients. Clear aligners came to existence at half the price of regular bracketed braces in order to help the consumer keep their normal lifestyles.
Yes. 95% of our clients get an accurate impression the first time. We have designed our impression material to make it easier for patients to use. We provide an instructional video for you to watch on YouTube – Click Here – as well as written instructions. Finally, we check the impression you made with a custom fit tray we send to you.
You have a personal patient portal where you can log in to track your progress with a 3D rendering of your future-teeth-movement and past-teeth-movement! You don’t even get to do that with your regular dentist!
If you lose one of the trays in your treatment, you will need to replace the tray at the normal price of $170.
There is a retainer program you can enroll in after the treatment. For $19.99 per month, a new retainer will be mailed to you every month to help maintain your teeth at night. Normally, a single retainer from your local dentist costs roughly $240. With our retainer program however, just mail in your old retainer and you get a brand new retainer every month for just $20 bucks! It’s important to keep refreshing your retainers per month because they are made from a thin plastic material that ends up breaking down with the way you grind your teeth at night and by your saliva. Not only will you get a fresh new retainer monthly, you will also get a health analysis that will analyze your previous retainer in order to tell you how much you grind your teeth at night, and to which sides are worse. We will also be able to track the movement in your teeth in case any adjustments need to be made. You will be able to log-in to your Patient Portal to review all notes and 3D models.
Once you order your Home Kit, we will mail out the kit with the starter fit trays to your home address. You will make the impression of your teeth into the molding trays and mail them back to us. Once you have mailed the kit back, you will log-in to the Patient Portal with your email address and Kit ID to pay for the treatment and to update any patient information or billing – unless you are participating in a financing program. Once the program has been paid for, or an arrangement has been made, we will mail out a box with the Fit Tray. Once you have confirmed the Fit tray fits around your teeth, we will then mail out the rest of your trays according to your payment plan.
By providing direct service to our clients allows us to make our products much more affordable.
No, we do not accept Dental Insurance. This decision helps actually make our product and process more affordable for the consumer. After speaking with one of the leading experts on dental claims, Tamesha Jackson, we found that dental insurance would actually require you to pay more out of pocket, as well as cause the process to take longer than it needs to in order to get that beautiful smile. Dental Insurance only covers half of the claim, with the minimum at $3,000 a claim in most cases. Not only that, but most insurance providers pay quarterly, which can cause a delay on treatment until we receive the funds. If treatment is delayed, there is a chance in which the insurance provider may pull the funds in which case we will have to start the process all over again causing further delay. When it’s all said and done, you would end up spending more money trying to get insurance claims involved as well as taking the chance to pay more money to restart the process.
Oral Surgery & Wisdom Tooth Extraction FAQs
Third molar extraction removal, more commonly known as Wisdom Teeth removal is an effective surgical procedure that has been around for ages.
Although some people have tried to challenge the validity in removing the third molar, countless studies have shown us that the removal of the teeth is actually better for the patient’s health, and further keeps them from undergoing future costly and painful dental surgery.
The removal of the third molars help reduce the risk of overcrowding teeth. With the way the jaw is shaped, the molars can grow in at unsightly angles, pushing and moving the teeth out of alignment, and causing a huge amount of distressful pain. Another risk in keeping the molars takes place when they break through the tissue. The space between the tooth and the tissue becomes a food trap, allowing bacteria and infection to take over the mouth.
The U.S. Army requires the wisdom teeth removal to take place if the soldier hasn’t already, to ensue health overseas. As you can imagine, proper care isn’t necessarily readily available to the soldiers, so if the third molars impact the mouth, they will be in a great amount of pain and run the risk of incurring severe infection.
The proper age to start looking into the removal of wisdom teeth is 14 years of age and older. [Source]
Many patients are consulted and treated the same day. This is typical for extractions that are simple. Otherwise, a consultation is done prior to surgery, and provides a non-threatening environment to discuss all your options and health status with the doctor. At your consultation you will be evaluated and diagnosed, fill out a full medical history and be able to discuss questions, risks, benefits, alternatives and financial matters. The consultation is done usually in advance to be able to confer with physicians and dentists if your care needs to be coordinated. At this time, arrangements can also be made for anesthesia and recovery.
At Dental Republic offices, the complete recovery time and procedure takes about and hour, but planned two hours for additional recovery time if needed.
In order to diagnose and treat any problems involving the teeth or jaw, X-rays are necessary. For wisdom tooth extraction, we will need a panoramic taken at our office on the same day of surgery. At the Allen Office, we use 3D Cone Beam Scan to insure the location of the tooth needing extraction, nerves, and blood vessels.
By placing Platelet Riched Plasma (PRP) at site of extraction. During the outpatient surgical procedure a small amount of your own blood is drawn out via the IV. This blood is then placed in the PRP centrifuge machine and spun down. In less than fifteen minutes, the Platelet Rich Plasma is formed and ready to be placed in site of tooth removal.
All instruments are cleaned and then sterilized after each use. Each instrument pack or bundle is tested with chemical indicators to confirm sterilization parameters have been achieved. Our autoclaves (sterilizers) are spore-tested with each use (state of Texas requires only weekly spore-testing) to ensure it is working properly prior to using the instruments. Each patient receives their own IV bag or nitrous mask to prevent transmission of disease to other patients. Our office was one of the first to exercise these precautions. We have set the standard for monitoring of instrument sterility in oral and maxillofacial surgery.
Parents of small children may accompany their child prior to surgery to ask the doctor any questions. However, OSHA regulations and staff and patient safety do not permit bystanders during the surgical procedure.
We accept American Express, Visa, Mastercard, Discover and Care Credit. We do not accept personal checks. You can apply at Care Credit for finance options in advance of your consultation.
Antibiotics are strong medicines that can save lives in the face of infection. However, they are not needed in every situation. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention has issued several warnings on the consequences of inappropriate use of antibiotics. As surgeons dealing mostly with the head and neck, we have the luxury of a region that has a very rich blood supply, and a tremendous ability to resist infection. It is for that reason that not every surgery we perform necessitates the use of antibiotics afterward. There have been numerous studies published that show the use of antibiotics after most oral surgery procedures in healthy patients does not affect the infection rate. The general rule at our practice is: If you need antibiotics to fight an infection, or if you have a disease that lessens your body’s ability to fight infection, a prescription will be given. If you do not fall into one of these categories, no antibiotics will be required. That does not necessarily mean that you will not get an infection afterward- just that the use of antibiotics after surgery will not change the risk.
Typically, this indicates some type of a localized infection. Please call our office, so Dr. Levin can evaluate this and recommend appropriate treatment.
Typically you should reduce activity right after surgery for 10-14 days before aggressive competition follows.
Numbness of the lip, tongue, gums, teeth etc. is a common occurrence after lower jaw surgery. It is usually caused by some type of irritation to the nerves involved and over 90% of the time resolves within a few days or weeks. Occasionally, it may take longer to resolve. Fortunately, it is just a feeling sensation and does not cause a muscle weakness. It is however, important for you to have us evaluate this so appropriate recommendations can be made.
We typically use resorbable sutures (stitches). They begin to dissolve within 2-3 days. Its ok for them to come out. If you notice any significant and persistent bleeding please let us know.
The “holes” or better, extraction sockets will generally close within 6 weeks. It will take about 24 months for the sockets to actually fill to about 94% with bone. If food gets trapped in the socket area, be sure to clean it with the water syringe given to you at the time of your surgery. SMOKING will delay healing and lead to infection during healing process.
No. The bad breath is from stuff getting into the socket area. Be sure to keep the surgery site clean and this should resolve.
Pain in the ear is generally referred pain from the lower jaw. This is normal and will resolve as the extraction site heals.
We don’t anticipate anything more than moderate swelling, but you take the anti-swelling medication that is prescribed to you to deal with swelling.
Dental Emergencies FAQs
First, thoroughly rinse your mouth with warm water. Use dental floss to remove any lodged food. If your mouth is swollen, apply a cold compress to the outside of your mouth or cheek. Never put aspirin or any other painkiller against the gums near the aching tooth because it may burn the gum tissue. See your dentist as soon as possible.
Save any pieces. Rinse the mouth using warm water; rinse any broken pieces. If there’s bleeding, apply pressure with a piece of gauze to the area for about 10 minutes or until the bleeding stops. Apply a cold compress to the outside of the mouth, cheek, or lip near the broken/chipped tooth to keep any swelling down and relieve pain. See your dentist as soon as possible.
Retrieve the tooth, hold it by the crown (the part that is usually exposed in the mouth), and rinse off the tooth root with water if it’s dirty. Do not scrub it or remove any attached tissue fragments. If possible, try to put the tooth back in place. Make sure it’s facing the right way. Never force it into the socket. If it’s not possible to reinsert the tooth in the socket, put the tooth in a small container of milk (or cup of water that contains a pinch of table salt, if milk is not available) or a product containing cell growth medium, such as Save-a-Tooth. In all cases, see your dentist as quickly as possible. Knocked out teeth with the highest chances of being saved are those seen by the dentist and returned to their socket within 1 hour of being knocked out.
See your dentist right away. Until you reach your dentist’s office, to relieve pain, apply a cold compress to the outside of the mouth or cheek in the affected area. Take an over-the-counter pain reliever (such as Tylenol or Advil) if needed.
As a temporary measure, stick a piece of sugarless gum into the cavity (sugar-filled gum will cause pain) or use an over-the-counter dental cement. See your dentist as soon as possible.
If the crown falls off, make an appointment to see your dentist as soon as possible and bring the crown with you. If you can’t get to the dentist right away and the tooth is causing pain, use a cotton swab to apply a little clove oil to the sensitive area (clove oil can be purchased at your local drug store or in the spice aisle of your grocery store). If possible, slip the crown back over the tooth. Before doing so, coat the inner surface with an over-the-counter dental cement, toothpaste, or denture adhesive, to help hold the crown in place. Do not use super glue!
If a wire breaks or sticks out of a bracket or band and is poking your cheek, tongue or gum, try using the eraser end of a pencil to push the wire into a more comfortable position. If you can’t reposition the wire, cover the end with orthodontic wax, a small cotton ball, or piece of gauze until you can get to your orthodontist’s office. Never cut the wire, as you could end up swallowing it or breathing it into your lungs.
Temporarily reattach loose braces with a small piece of orthodontic wax. Alternatively, place the wax over the braces to provide a cushion. See your orthodontist as soon as possible. If the problem is a loose band, save it and call your orthodontist for an appointment to have it recemented or replaced (and to have missing spacers replaced).
Abscess are infections that occur around the root of a tooth or in the space between the teeth and gums. Abscesses are a serious condition that can damage tissue and surrounding teeth, with the infection possibly spreading to other parts of the body if left untreated so see your dentist right away.
To ease the pain and draw the pus toward the surface, try rinsing your mouth with a mild salt water solution (1/2 teaspoon of table salt in 8 ounces of water) several times a day.
- Rinse your mouth with a mild salt-water solution.
- Use a moistened piece of gauze or tea bag to apply pressure to the bleeding site. Hold in place for 15 to 20 minutes.
- To both control bleeding and relieve pain, hold a cold compress to the outside of the mouth or cheek in the affected area for 5 to 10 minutes.
- If the bleeding doesn’t stop, see your dentist right away or go to a hospital emergency room. Continue to apply pressure on the bleeding site with the gauze until you can be seen and treated.
Dental Implants FAQs
A dental implant is a screw that is placed into the bone to serve as a replacement for the root of a tooth or a group of teeth. An abutment or support goes on top of the implant for the crown to rest upon.
You should do what you would be doing prior to getting a filling, deep cleaning, or extraction. Just relax. If you are getting IV sedation during surgery, then do not eat anything 6 hours before the surgery.
YES! We always welcome additional relevant information to improve our service to you. However, we will need to take our own current x-rays and possible CT the day before or during treatment to have the best pictures for your service.
Our surgeon has been trained to evaluate your medical conditions prior to your treatment. They have certain contraindications they will look for prior to treatment. So, if you wish to have a physical you may; however, it is not necessary under normal circumstances.
In most cases: NO. The only issues that may arise are during radiation therapy and with conditions such as diabetes that are not under control. Our trained surgeon will evaluate you during your dental exam.
In most cases, it will take about two treatment appointments which last for about 1-2 hours per appointment. Our surgeon will be able to give you a more specific time frame when he has access to your oral conditions.
Some of our surgeons have taken about 30 minutes for one implant and about 3 hours for a complete mouth reconstruction. Again, it will depend on the complexity of your treatment. We will do our best to make you as comfortable as possible.
Antibiotics are like seat belts in a car. You take them for extra precautions to prevent infection before and after surgery. The pain medication we prescribe is to increase your comfort. Some patients find that they do not need any pain medication.
IV (intravenous) sedation has been very popular in our clinic. The sedation will increase comfort. The cost of IV sedation is about $800 for the first hour to cover the medication and service.
Nitrous sedation (“laughing gas”) is always available for all of our patients during treatment. There is a cost associated with providing the service.
Almost always there will be some tissue or bone grafting. Remember that when you have lost your tooth, there is a high possibility of tissue and bone loss. Even taking an extraction out will cause damage to adjacent bone that may also need bone and tissue grafting.
The dental implants we use are made of titanium and are FDA approved. Titanium implants have been used since the 1950’s because of their high biocompatibility (“bonds well with bone”) and close-to-bone elasticity (“flexibility”). Therefore, there is a high chance of success. Below is a research abstract providing data on the successes of implants:
Misch CE, Dietsh-Misch F, Hoar J, Beck G, Hazen R, Misch CM.
ABSTRACT
This report presents the data from a prospective study of a bone quality based implant system. The surgical survival of 975 implants was 99.4%, with 100% survival in D4 bone. Three critical phases of bone loss were identified: bone remodeling from stage I to stage II surgery; stage II uncovery to prosthesis delivery (transition period); and prosthesis delivery up to the first year loading (early loading bone loss). The stage I to stage II uncovery crestal bone remodeling resulted in a mean vertical bone loss of .021 mm to 0.36 mm (SD = 0.90 mm), dependent on whether the implant became exposed to the oral cavity during osseous healing. No statistically significant difference was found among the four implant designs, implant diameter, bone density or location. The stage II uncovery to prosthesis delivery mean vertical bone loss ranged from 0.12 mm to 0.20 mm. One hundred three consecutive patients were restored, with 360 implants and 105 prosthesis in function for a period of 12 to 26 months. No early loading implant failure occurred. The mean early loading bone loss was 0.29 mm (SD = 0.99 mm). Past clinical reports indicate most failures or crestal bone loss occur by the first year of loading. This study suggests the bone quality based dental implant design minimizes overall failure and crestal bone loss, regardless of bone density.
©J Oral Implantol. 1999;25(3):185-197.
If your INR (International Normalize Ratio) is 2 or less then we can do treatment. We can test for you INR at the office on the day of your treatment. If your INR is above 2, you need to consult your physician. Sometime doctors will put you on Heparin instead of your regular blood thinner. Heparin can be stopped an hour before surgery. Other times they may take you off your blood thinner for a day or two before surgery. Again you INR must be 2 or less.
Generally the rule of thumb is to get off the medication for 8 weeks before surgery and wait another 8 weeks after surgery before taking the medication again. You should consult your physician. IV sedation for bone loss will be on a case-to-case basis.
We try to use autograft (your own harvested bone and tissue), so in this case there will be no problem. The allograft we use (not your tissue and bone) have blood cells removed, so there will be no Rh sensitivity.
Plate Enrich Plasma treatment may assist the bone and tissue healing. Your blood is taken and centrifuged to concentrate the healing factors. The healing factors are delivered to the surgery site. Evidence based research has shown that PRP treatment does increase healing. We provide this at our dental center.
We do not reduce quality or service to get a value cost. We get the value by analyzing and improving our surgical process on every surgery day. Our doctors are like scientists and engineers combined. They will use the best materials and spend the appropriate time to service our clients. They will use their problem solving abilities learned through experience and continuing education to adapt to each unique patient.
Technically YES! However, it depends on how far you are in your orthodontic treatment and if any missing teeth are close to their final plan position. Placed in implants will not move like natural teeth because they are osseointegrated (“fused”) to the surrounding bone.
– Ask yourself this question. Do you use a pin to hang a picture on the wall or the appropriately sized screw? The implant has to be a reasonable size to structurally handle the chewing forces of the mouth and anchor to the quality of bone at the implant site. We find that mini implants are not appropriately sized or designed to meet our needs of quality and longevity.
NO! Our dental implants are made of titanium which is a paramagnetic metal. Paramagnetic metals interact weakly with electric fields so they will not set off metal detectors. Therefore, credit cards, like the American Express Black, are made of titanium.
Yes. We will engineer the placement and contacts of the opposing teeth to appropriately distribute the biting forces. Furthermore, we will highly recommend a mouth guard at night to prevent grinding. Most grinding occurs during the sleeping hours of the night.
– Dental implants are reversible. We can remove them if they fail, and place in another implant at the same location with a different design and size or place in another implant at an adjacent site. Like getting on a plane, it is very successful yet may include risks.
Porcelain gum and teeth will not stain, are stronger, last longer, and appear more realistic then acrylic gum and teeth. Imagine a porcelain bowl verse a plastic acrylic bowl: which stains more? – acrylic. Acrylic teeth and gum will last about 5-7 years, and porcelain gum and teeth are more likely to last beyond that time frame.
We recommend relaxing after the surgery. We will give you prescriptions for medications (antibiotic, pain, mouth rinse) and a ice pack to take home with you to apply to the surgery site to prevent swelling. Try not to sleep on the side of the surgery site. However, some of our patients have gone golfing or shopping after their surgery.
Feel free to use our online chat. Our representative will try to answer your questions as best as they can, or else they will forward your contact information to our surgeon. Our surgeon will answer your question within 48 hours. Click here to contact us.
Traditional & Indirect Braces FAQs
Indirect bonding allows for more precise placement of brackets compared to the original technique of mounting each one by hand. This is because we make a custom mold of your teeth to work off of. Indirect orthodontics allow the brackets to be placed precisely in the molded tray that will then be placed in your mouth to ensure proper position while bonding. This procedure takes far less time and effort to complete which provides added comfort to the patient. The ease of this indirect method also helps when the patient is young and cannot hold still for long. Not having to hand place brackets in the back of the mouth also eliminates discomfort to patients.
Brackets are bonded onto each tooth and wired together with small rubberbands to cause pressure. This constant pressure slowly moves teeth.
Neither is a better choice than the other. They work in the same way to move teeth into the correct position. Some things to think about in your decision are aesthetics, cost, how long you will have to wear them for, and the effects each will have on your teeth, depending on factors such as severity of overbite or crookedness of teeth.
Yes. With the indirect bonding method, only a tray is inserted in your mouth to adhere the brackets to your teeth instead of hands trying to place each bracket individualy, which can get tiring for the patient from holding still and feling discomfort during the back molars bracket placement. The procedure also takes less than 30 minutes, so you will not have to wait long. There are less than 10 minutes where we must keep your teeth dry with retractors that some may find uncomfortable.
The entire procedure typically takes 30 minutes.
The wire is adjusted about once a month.
There is no upper limit of age for braces if you are in good oral and medical health. However, you have to be old enough to have your permanent teeth and in good oral and medical health.
Currently, you can get started with traditional indirect orthodontics at Dental Republic for only $99.
Straight teeth give our clients the added confidence in their image. Straight teeth makes it easier to floss and brush because there are less food traps; therefore, less chance of cavities and periodontal disease. Straight teeth reduce stress on your Temporal Mandibular Joint created by misaligned teeth. Straight teeth reduce the wear and tear of the surfaces of your teeth through grinding. Cavity detection by your dentist is easier, according to our supporting dentist.
We work together to improve people's smiles
