Dental Crowns - the Whitest Color on the Market?

When a dentist matches the color of a tooth, a shade guide is used. This is usually a starting point. Each manufacturer of porcelain has a shade guide that they match to. You should ask your dentist for the bleach guide for that porcelain type. The bleach guide is usually a separate set of whiter teeth shades. That way you can look at several different "white" shades and get an ideal of what will work best for you. The key to having a whiter shade, is making it look natural. You can also request of the dentist to have the lab make a few different custom shade tabs that will fit over your tooth to see what looks the nicest with your smile. There will probably be a lab charge associated with this, but it is well worth doing.

You can get your veneers or crowns in any shade you wish - including very bleached white.  For dentists, there are several 'Shade guides' on the market - each shade guide will have a different code for bleach white.

OM1 is the whitest shade in one of the guides I use, or BL1 in another.  Your dentist can show you the shade guide used in the office and you can make note of it then.

You can also request an even whiter shade, if that suites your needs.  'Custom' bleach shades are mixed by the dental ceramist during the creation of your case.  As a patient, you have the right to select any shade that you fancy.  Best of luck!

This needs to be discussed with your dentist and the lab doing the crowns. They may have a porcelain that is whiter...

Hi Missk11

There are different guides for classifying tooth shade. 

The systems are for communication between the dentist and the ceramist. 

Depending on the system, 00 might very well be the 'whitest' shade, while another system might call the same shade OM3, or 010.  So without knowing what shade guide system you are asking about its not possible to say what is the whitest.  Although, going by the way they are usually organized, 00 or 000 sounds like it could be the whitest.

Rather than talk about the shades in 'code' with your dentist, I suggest you ask him to show you his/her shade guide personally.