It used to be that once you got discolored teeth, you were stuck with them. Now, however, technology has helped dentists to come up with ways to make teeth whiter in no time at all.
Professional teeth whitening has become very popular in the last 10 years, and more and more, even the average dental office is offering it as an option. Manufacturers, however, have been quick to jump on the whitening bandwagon and are now offering a variety of do-it-yourself at-home kits for sale. But can at-home whitening kits really measure up to professional teeth whitening?
At-home Whitening
The first thing to know about at-home whitening kits is that they're much less expensive than professional services. The price of a professional visit will vary depending on the dentist but can run anywhere from a few hundred, to a few thousand dollars. The average price of do-it-yourself whitening kits runs anywhere from $25 to $100.
While the at-home whitening kits are much less expensive, it's also generally a much longer process. The at-home kits require that the purchaser devote a fair amount of time to the project of whitening teeth, often asking them to wear a special whitening tape around their teeth for hours at a time, or asking them to mix together chemicals into a foam tooth mold and to put it on their teeth for anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour each day.
In-office Whitening
Professional teeth whitening, however, is done at the
dentist's office and generally takes no longer than an hour and a half from start to finish. The procedure usually only has to be done once, as it can lighten teeth up to 10 shades in just one sitting.
Both at-home whitening kits and a professional teeth whitening appointment have their pros and cons. Ultimately, it is up to the consumer to make the choice of whether they'd like to have expensive, professional results, or the inexpensive, uncertain results that are what occurs when an at-home whitening kit is used.