Cosmetic dentistry? First do no harm?

The historical ethical principle of non-maleficence (do no harm) is addressed. Many of the developments in modern dentistry have made it easier to do biologic harm quicker than ever before.

Many `cosmetic gurus` promote techniques and approaches that produce short term gains at a huge long term biological cost that is not always made clear to patients in advance nor are they made aware of alternatives.

The problem of unnecessary destruction of teeth for elective `cosmetic` dentistry is discussed and how to avoid unnecessary destruction of teeth while still solving patients problems demonstrated.

The following topics are covered:

• Ethics
• Biological cost of tooth preparation
• Bleaching
• Bonding

On completion you will:

• Have a greater understanding of what to avoid and how to still solve problems in a biologically sensible manner.
• Be aware of how to achieve satisfactory results with a pragmatic combination of bleaching and bonding and changes in vertical dimension.