2nd Chance for a Beautiful Smile! Metal Braces over 20 Years Ago - Denver, CO

I have been growing unhappy more and more recently with my smile and I really wanted braces, but I just could not see spending thousands of dollars on braces when my teeth really aren't too bad. I was searching around on Real Self and I found SmileCareClub which is a fraction of the cost of Invisalign, though the two brands look similar, they have many differences. I have done tons of research and the only negative comments I've read were from orthodontists who sell Invisalign, who have an obvious conflict with the product. My teeth are healthy and I see a dentist regularly. I had metal braces at age 19. I've always thought of my previous orthodontic clinic as a "braces factory". This ortho office would have like 20 chairs lined up and the technicians did all the work while the practitioner just signed off on things. I was young, broke and naive and I remember the doc saying, "they're ready to come off" and they were actually still crooked when the braces were removed. I've always been angry that I let that happen, but I had no mentors in life; I was on my own at that point. My metal braces came off several months early because the doc said they were ready, but I still paid the full amount. I think this clinic was called Apple Ortho-something (in Texas) and I would be surprised if it was still open. I wore my top retainer for the majority of 2.5 years and I had a fixed banded bottom retainer. Somewhere down the line the wire broke on my bottom retainer. Also at the time my dentist refused to pull my wisdom teeth. I have a very small mouth and I strongly believe the wisdom teeth did contribute to my tooth movement. Dentists have agreed and disagreed with me on this, but the dentist who refused to pull the teeth......I still hold a lot of contempt for. I currently have mild-mod crowding in the front upper and lower teeth. My lateral incisors stick out and as a kid it was described as "vampire teeth" and I think it's unattractive. My teeth aren't as bad as when I had metal braces in 1994, but they seem to continue to move even after all these years. My teeth shifted about 3 years after the braces came off and did seem to stabilize. I had two back to back pregnancies at 38 and 39 years old. I've heard that teeth movement can accelerate during pregnancy and again certain dentists have told me that this isn't true, but my teeth did move significantly during my pregnancies.

Right now I have the starter set of trays and I will continue to wear them until my real trays arrive. I'm on the smile 10 plan, which is 10 trays each for upper and lower arch, to be worn for 3 weeks before moving to the next set of trays.

I first heard about SmileCareClub in Real Self and came across a voucher on Living Social for the impressions kit + a $200 off treatment coupon (I think it was$19.00 ? For the voucher). I had to take several pictures of my mouth/teeth from different angles. Then once my cased was approved I received my impressions kit, which was very easy to make because I watched the videos and followed the directions very closely. After sending in the impressions it took approximately 4-5 weeks to receive my treatment plan. During this time I confirmed my orthodontic benefit with my insurance, which covers 50%. I've had my treatment plan for almost one month and today moved forward with purchasing the trays. The insurance must be completed by the patient, but SCC assists with the necessary forms and it seems fairly straightforward. I will give an update on that as soon as I have anything new. The remainder qualifies for HSA reimbursement and again I will update with any info on how that goes. I'm really excited to get started. It takes about 21 business days to get the trays. Holidays and weekends do count, so I'm guessing my treatment will start the end of January and should be completed by the end of August. After completion my goal is to get fixed retainers for both arches to insure my compliance with retaining.

I received all of my aligners yesterday. They arrived via FedEx from Nashville. I expected them 1st week of February so I'm impressed the got here so early. The aligners are the same material as the starter trays excepted they have my patient number on them in a hidden spot. They come with a remover tool, a set of chewies to set them properly, a file to adjust the free edge and a new case. The starter trays also come with a tool, file, chewies and case. It's good to have extras. This 1st set of trays haven't hurt at all. They look and feel fine.

The only issues I've had are that I called prior to Christmas just to get the scoop on the insurance. I had to leave a voicemail. I wanted to check if I should start the insurance reimbursement before the end if 2015 or if it would be okay to start filing insurance after 2016. I purchased my treatment plan in 2015, but didn't get the aligners until 2016, so I wanted to be sure I would qualify for reimbursement. I never heard back from anyone at the company. Today I got an email from two people who will counsel me thru my treatment and remind me to change my aligners every 3 weeks. The email basically said to contact them with any questions. I called them to find out what's up with the insurance and to discuss why I haven't received a response from my December voicemail. My call went to voicemail again and the name in the greeting was not their names. So I emailed and discussed my situation and told them I was blogging on here about my experience. Hopefully I can get some answers quickly. If I'm hosed now on the insurance, because this guy never responded to my voicemail I'll be packing the aligners up and requesting a refused. So far not happy with the customer service. I'll keep you posted!

Quick recap- I paid for the treatment aligners in full, mid-December. I've been attempting to reach someone in the billing/insurance department since my purchase to discuss insurance filing questions because it was my understanding that I needed to do everything on my own, in the filing process. I knew I would need documentation to go along with the form to obtain reimbursement. I work in the medical field and have some prior knowledge to I'm okay doing this. My concern was the change of year and when my treatment officially started 2015 or 2016.

I'd been attempting to contact billing/insurance and my patient care specialist via phone, vm, email and the SCC chat since mid-December and I'd had absolutely no responses. Today I did reach someone. She was very nice and explained that SCC fills out the paperwork and sends the documents to the patient to file herself. This makes it even easier for the patient. The problem for me is the NO RESPONSE at all! I get that this was happening thru 2 major holidays, I paid for a treatment/service and I had questions. SCC has a responsibility to be available to their patients within a reasonable amount of time and they were not, so I felt I was left hanging. I had my aligners ready to be returned and for now I have that on hold. I feel that once insurance is taken care of, my treatment should be on autopilot for the most part and I'm hopeful it will be smooth sailing from this point on.

Treatment wise, I'm still on 1st set of aligners and they are fairly comfortable. My speech is mumble-y, which I'm working on. I don't eat between meals because it's a pain to have to brush/floss all the time so hopefully I lose that bad habit. I'm drinking water all the time instead of snacking. The free edge painfully rubs the inside of my mouth in certain areas. I've been putting a tiny bit of dental wax to help with that. SCC supplies a file, but so far filing the sharp edges had made it worse.

Good luck to you if you're just starting! Just call everyday until you get a hold of someone at SCC but hopefully you will have a better experience with that!