Featuring Invisalign, Angel, & Spark Clear Aligners
You can find Invisalign™, Angel, and Spark™ Clear Aligner treatment at Knapp Orthodontics.
Huntsville Clear Aligners
Perhaps you had braces in the past but want to touch up your teeth as they have shifted since your first orthodontic treatment.
Maybe you prefer not to go into braces because you want something less noticeable.
Clear aligners may be the solution for you. Dr. Knapp currently has patients in two types of clear aligner companies: Invisalign and Spark.
These are both very great products and work very similarly. Due to a few advantages, Dr. Knapp is primarily focusing on using Spark Clear Aligners.
How Do Clear Aligners Work?
If Dr. Knapp decides that you’re a good candidate for clear aligners, our team will scan your teeth using our 3D intraoral scanner. Then, we’ll send that to the aligner company.
Dr. Knapp and the aligner company will work on a personalized plan for your teeth in order to achieve the best result possible. Once a plan has been agreed on, the aligner company will ship all of the aligners to the office.
The total number of aligners will vary from 20-80 depending on the severity of your case. Once we get the aligners, we will contact you and schedule an appointment to give them to you.
You will come into our Huntsville office for a 45-60 minute appointment. During this appointment, we’ll place the tooth-colored attachments onto your teeth (the picture below shows what attachments look like).
Then, we’ll send you home with a certain number of aligners to change every 7-14 days as described by Dr. Knapp.
You’ll work through that first set of aligners we give you, and then you will return for us to check your teeth and provide you with additional aligners.
After we are finished with all of the aligners that the company sent us, we’ll oftentimes scan your teeth again and send them back to the aligner company to touch up some teeth that need additional care and attention.
This process is repeated until Dr. Knapp and you are happy with where your teeth are at.
Benefits
Clear aligners give you the flexibility to control when you do and don’t wear them. Although we still ask patients to wear their aligners 22-23 hours a day – the more, the better.
They are less noticeable compared to traditional braces.
Clear aligner patients tend to have better oral hygiene because they can brush and floss much more easily.
There is also not nearly as long of a list of foods that you can’t eat with clear aligners because you don’t have to worry about popping a bracket off.
Clear aligners can move certain teeth in a precise manner while not moving other teeth if we desire. This means that we can focus on the teeth that are bothering you much faster.
Traditional braces tend to move all of the teeth at once. Clear aligners are great at really fine-tuning and detailing the teeth for that perfect smile.
Considerations
We ask that patients wear their clear aligners for 22-23 hours a day — the more, the better.
In order to move a round, slippery tooth, we often have to put tooth-colored “attachment” onto some teeth. These attachments allow us to hold onto the teeth and move them.
Without the attachments, some movements are not very likely to happen efficiently. Here’s a picture of what attachments look like with the aligner out (top teeth) and with the aligner in (bottom teeth).
Aligners should be removed to eat, drink, and brush your teeth. We ask that you only drink water with your aligners in as we don’t want sugary or acidic drinks to damage your teeth by sitting in the aligners.
Since you are in control of whether the aligners are in your mouth, be sure always to put your aligners in the case so that you don’t misplace them.
Clear Aligner FAQs
Are Clear Aligners for Everyone?
Clear aligners have their strengths and weaknesses. As such, they’re not the best treatment for all types of patients.
However, with improved technology, clear aligners are getting better and better. Dr. Knapp will evaluate whether you are a good candidate for clear aligners at your first free consultation.