Fine-Tuning and Patient Communication Lead to Success, Shade matching is a sometimes difficult process that involves a variety of colors and characteristics. Couple this with a patient base that often encompasses a wide range of ages and final restorations can frequently require adjustment or repair because they have failed to match the patient’s natural teeth. Astro Dental Art has many highly trained and approved technicians of shade matching to ensure patient satisfaction.

Contact our specialist get more information about ‘Custom Shade Service’ for your patient. Check out our Shade Service Info Guidelines.

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STEP-BY-STEP PROCESS

There are certain step-by-step keys to look for in the shade-matching process. First, the enamel overlay and translucency color should be examined all the way to the gingival area, noting especially how thick the effect is inside the dentin color. The value and chroma must also be noted—how high, low, or different are they? With a traditional shade guide, the technician is not able to accurately account for this information, which means it will need to be recorded separately.

Hydration versus dehydration stages must then be noted. The author’s method of shade-taking dictates that the technician has a strategy in place beforehand for dealing with these stages. Oftentimes, a patient will become dehydrated before the technician is able to accurately note color, translucency, and mamelon.

The color of the adjacent teeth should be carefully noted, with the patient and the clinician indicating which adjacent teeth to mimic. This is especially true if there is a crown involved or the color of the teeth varies from one to the next. The patient will usually have a preference about which color he or she is interested in matching—and in not matching.

Custom shading is a science, and achieving the delicate balance of enamel overlay, translucency or transparency, and surface texture in the incisal, gingival, or body one third, as well as in the mesial and distal areas, requires a skill and artistry level that even experienced technicians may have a hard time mastering. The technician has only about 2 to 5 minutes to match a patient’s color. Once a patient’s mouth has been opening and closing beyond that period of time, a difference in the color and translucency of the teeth becomes evident due to dehydration. It is absolutely essential to keep this in mind when making note of the patient’s custom color.

Because of this potential change due to dehydration, technicians must check the patient’s saliva level at all times by opening his or her lips and frequently examining for hydration. Translucency and transparency enamel modifications depend on the colors that are applied. Whether these colors are white, clear, blue, reddish-orange, or pinkish-gray, without saliva the technician will not know which colors to apply or where to apply them.