Will the Crown Lengthening Create Gaps Between my Teeth?

Crown lengthening is a procedure that will lengthen the crown the tooth by reducing the bone around the tooth.  This will make the tooth appear longer, but will not create gaps between teeth.  This is a recommended treatment for a gummy smile, since the gums follow the contour of the bone.  Best, Dr. Elizabeth Jahanian

Crown lengthening performed by experienced periodontal specialist is not a challenging procedure and outcome should not create any gaps. I hope that you are working with a restorative dentist (hopefully prosthodontist) who analyzed your smile, made an ideal wax-up of your new gingival margin levels and communicated that information to your periodontal specialist. Also depending on how much gingival tissue will be removed you might need some kind of restorations ( maybe veneers or crowns) to achieve the best aesthetic result, but then again, that should be discussed with your restorative doctor in preparation to the crown lengthening procedure and you (I hope) already aware of it. Good luck!

There are many ways to treat a gummy smile, so before you have the procedure done, get good advice.  That may mean you need to do your research.  The key is that you can get black triangles after crown lengthening so you need to know exactly what to expect.  We can not guarantee results but we can give you an idea of what we think, so you are prepared.

When you do crown lengthening you can get rid of the gummy smile but you need to know if your teeth are small, if they had delayed erruption, if your top jaw is misaligned, etc.  Why do you have a gummy smile?

Depending on what challenges you are dealing with, that will affect the outcome.  When the surgeon does crown lengthening, if your papillae(the area of gum inbetween your teeth) are altered, you can get black triangles.  You need to find find out what your needs are and go from there.

You can sometimes treat a gummy smile with Botox.  Black triangles can sometimes be solved with bonding and/or veneers as well.  Good luck.