Braces & pulling teeths

[claes]

Hi, I'm sorry if my English is bad. I am 32 and have two narrow and misaligned front teeths, so I'm getting braces. However, the first step in this procedure is to pull two teeths to make room (the forth tooth to each side has been decided).

This seems to me it will leave a large gap, that the braces will then fill in after adjustment. But then I read about a guy whose gap wasn't filled after the braces and he was devastated for ever going through with it!

I'm in the same position. I would like to have my front teeths corrected with braces, but if that could result in a smile two years later with gaps at the sides I would hate myself for ever doing this.

The gaps from pulling those two teeths just seems to wide... And even if it succeeds in being covered by adjusting the teeths surrounding it, I guess the gum area where the old teeths were rooted will always remain a gap.

Do you always pull "almost front teeths" when aligning with braces? And can you see years later that those have been pulled?

I'm worried.

[Dr Pav Khaira]

I would speak to your dentist about the concerns you have. It may be possible for your dentist to take moulds of your teeth and move the teeth on the model to show you how much space you will have left. There will probably be a charge for this but at least you will know what the final result will look like!

Hope this helps

[Dr Sepehrara]

Hello!

I completely understand how you feel.

Generally, if the front teeth are crowded, it is very common to extract the 4's on either side- the first premolars. This is because they are nearer to the front teeth and they are a good size, so when they are extracted they will leave enough space for the crowding to be corrected.

Sometimes there can be residual spacing left by a few millimetres. Some patients are already happy with the results and do not want any further treatment to close the minor gap. Sometimes the gap can be larger, but the possibility of this occuring has to be discussed with your orthodontist.

Hope this helps and best of luck

Kind Regards

Raha

[claes]

Hi, I just want to thank you for your help. Your answers are very valuable and it gives me more insight in what I'm about to do. It is of great value to hear it from a third party, so your service is excellent!