The lifestyle choices that a person makes eventually affects the colour of their teeth. Unfortunately, this is also true for dentures. Drinking red wine, smoking and even a love of coffee and tea is going to take your dentures from pearly white to dreary grey eventually. As someone who has noticed this issue recently, you are tempted to repair the dentures yourself. The problem is, this does not lead to great results. This is what you need to know about stained dentures and how to go about denture repairs.
Why do stains appear?
Just like the enamel of your teeth, dentures have small porous holes which trap certain substances. Have you ever looked at the inside of a coffee cup after you have used it a few times and noticed it looks dirty despite being washed? This is because tea and coffee deposit a small residue in your cup each time you have a drink. This residue layers upon itself as you drink more coffee and tea until you see a noticeable buildup. The nicotine from cigarettes and tannins from red wine cause similar stains to that from tea and coffee. Unfortunately, brushing alone does not remove this type of stain.
So, what are your options when you want to make your dentures nice and white again?
Can dentures be whitened at home?
Many people attempt to bring their smiles back to a bright white state by using an at-home kit. Unfortunately, there are a couple of reasons why it is not a good idea to home whiten dentures:
- Your unfamiliarity with the chemicals involved in a teeth whitening kit could lead to permanent damage to the surface of the dentures if a too-strong solution is applied which removes the protective covering.
- Bad-quality teeth whitening kits contain harsh abrasives which can scratch dentures.
Strong and abrasive chemicals can also weaken the integrity of your dentures. This leads to the chance of breakage happening in the future.
The odds are high that you will damage your dentures trying to whiten them at home, so the better option is to take them to your denturist so they can do the whitening process for you. It is advisable to let all denture repairs be handled by a professional who knows what they are doing. When you trust your denture repair to such a person, you can be confident that your dentures won't sustain any further damage during the repair process.
