Question:
Any recommendations on "home" whitening? Are there any toothpastes out
there that are especially good??
Answer:
In the past couple of months I've used the Rapid White system and I'm
on my third day of Crest Whitestrips.
My teeth are stained from drinking cola (Diet Pepsi and I have a long
and loving relationship), and using whitening toothpastes did a little
bit of good but not enough for me to be satisfied.
I tried the Rapid White kit first. It consists of a pre-treatment
toothpaste, gel tray (for upper and lower teeth at the same time) that
you fill with the whitening agent, and a mouth rinse for use after the
gel. A plastic strip with color samples (of degrees of tooth
staining) is also included. I think the entire kit was about $17 or
so from one of the online drugstores.
The paste in the kit is nice, leaves teeth smooth and tastes fine.
The gel tastes DISGUSTING. No flavoring in it at all, just an icky
bleach-y taste. Yuk. The rinse is strongly flavored, a really sweet
mint flavor - they probably did that to counteract the disgusting
bleaching gel aftertaste.
I started out being around Shade 8 on the 16-shade scale. After using
the kit twice daily for two weeks I ended up as a Shade 6. That is
progress, but for the discomfort (the gel tray is big and bulky - my
lips wouldn't close over it) and the awful taste of the gel I wasn't
really all that keen on another two weeks of it. I didn't experience
any tooth or gum sensitivity though, I will say that.
I ordered the Crest Whitestrips online, I think that was $33 (free
shipping plus a $5 off coupon at the site). You receive a set of
strips for upper teeth, which you are to use first (as in, do the
entire regimen on your upper teeth, after all of those strips are
done, do the lower teeth) and then ones for the lower. The regimen is
2 weeks for each set.
A strip is a very thin and flexible piece of plastic mesh with
whitening agent on it. You place the plastic against your teeth and
smooth it down, tucking any remaining plastic under the bottom of your
teeth. It's almost invisible when in place and doesn't affect your
appearance at all; I can talk quite easily with the strip in place
with just a faint sort of lisp resulting from it (probably from just
not being used to having it in place).
You use 2 strips per day. You may use them back to back (which is
what I have been doing). While I haven't noticed any gum sensitivity
(I do try to get as little of the strip on my gum as possible though),
I have noticed that my the treated teeth will ache just a little bit
when I first apply the second strip. This only lasts a couple of
minutes and is just discomfort, not really painful.
After 3 days I can see as much progress with the Crest Whitestrips as
I did with 2 weeks of the Rapid White. Using the color strip which
came with the Rapid White, I've gone from a 7 to a 5. (My teeth did
get stained after the Rapid White kit was done from, you guessed it,
guzzling more Diet Pepsi.)
I'm quite pleased with the strips. When the lower set is done I may,
depending on how the results work out, use a second kit (this is okay
according to their instruction book).
While the Whitestrips are twice as expensive as the other kit, I'm
seeing much faster results, the Whitestrips are faintly mint flavored
with none of the horrid aftertaste of the Rapid White, it's a 2 step
instead of 3 step process (you just brush your teeth and then apply
the strip) and best of all, no tray. Just the thin plastic held in
place by the gel.
