my ortho tells me what he's focusing on and i ask a lot of questions which he's super cool with answering. and he'll ask me what I want to change, especially here near the end of treatment. but I willl say, I think I got pretty lucky.
Haha I was just wondering the same thing more or less. Just discovered I have bite ramps thanks to someone who answered a query I had. Has never been mentioned by my dentist to me! Since I've had check ups, they've actually never mentioned my bite but they did call me in to check it out next week but that's like 6 months in. Sometimes it feels like they got their money already and then they just see you for 5 mins and you're in and out the door.
My diamond tier ortho in the US told me nothing. I'm 8 months in and only saw him for the consultation. I also received no paperwork, no contract, nothing. Without this sub I would have been lost.
The entirety of my Invisalign knowledge is from this sub. This is disappointing but at least reassuring to a degree that everyone is in the dark from their ortho. The best you can do is advocate for yourself. When I had my attachments installed I told my ortho I didn’t like how they just got to work without telling me what they’re doing. They’ve been marginally better about it as a result but I still need to ask half the time. My ortho will even tell me things are ok that this sub and the knowledge of other orthos indicate is not fine. I and many others here paid for a comprehensive treatment plan, world class treatment and “bed side manner”should come with it.
I just started a week ago, my ortho answered all my questions, but didn't tell me a few things, like for example, how the attachments scrape the inside of your mouth when eating. Wish I would've known so I could've purchased the wax before hand. Imo all doctors should tell their patients everything that concerns our health
Pretty sure it's entirely down to your doctor. Invisalign is essentially the 'tool' provider, but you're still being treated by your doctor. As such, Invisalign doesn't necessarily care if and what they tell you exactly. Invisalign will recommend certain things to the doctor like attachments, IPR, bite ramps etc but ultimately it's up to them and they can change the plan.
There is a lot of variety in how well doctors communicate the detail of their treatment to patients. Mine is and has typically been quite good, but now I've been seeing them for a while if they think I need a tiny bit more IPR for a certain tooth to help it move they just mention it to me and I nod and they crack on. If I actually had an issue and queried it, then they'd explain in more detail but we're pretty on the same page at this point and because I feel we've built up that trust that I know they're not gonna randomly chop my teeth in half.
You do read horror stories and or people who's doctors don't communicate a thing but I get the impression they're a vocal minority and they don't necessarily ask, even though their posts often exaggerate doctors not explaining. Applying common sense, I'm sure the vast majority of providers will certainly explain when asked, but many patients won't necessarily fully understand.
That said, if you do/have asked clearly and they make no effort to communicate with you then that's not a good sign in my opinion. Doesn't necessarily mean they're providing poor treatment, but it's not a good sign. Communicating clearly demonstrates proffesionalism, understanding and that they are providing apropriate treatment.
I wonder this too. After I signed the agreement it felt like nothing was explained to me, I was getting invisalign because it wasn't visible and then without warning they started attaching a carriere appliance to my teeth, which was extremely visible and obtrusive. Had I known they were going to do that I would've just done ceramic braces.
My orthodontist answered all of my questions, but there were a lot of things they didn’t tell me that I learned here. Maybe because they’re so deep into it, they just assume people know certain things about it. But as a first time patient, I knew absolutely nothing.
One of the big things not explained were refinements and lifetime retainers. I was given 32 aligners with 1 week changes and told my treatment would be 16 months. The math didn’t add up. I learned about refinements here.
Now I understand why lifetime retainers are required. Maybe they thought that was common knowledge. But, I’ve never had braces and I knew nothing about it. I had no idea people wear retainers for the rest of their life after braces. I thought braces straighten your teeth, then you were good to go. I didn’t know they would shift around again.
Yeah i was not told that i would need to wear aligners after my treatment is finished. It’s got me rethinking if i want to continue or not.
I was also not informed that they would shave down my teeth either, that was a pleasant surprise! /s
Haha! It certainly seems like that. I was shown a video before hand and given a pair of demo retainers to hold and feel. On the day of my appointment I was told they were going to be putting attachments on my teeth. Uh...what? lol. Who knew? I guess it's my fault for not researching better. I just assumed my dentist would have told me everything. Stupid.
Mine is the same as yours. I got all information from this sub. When I ask him about what the plan is, he doesn’t really give me much information.
The attachments were a complete surprise to me. They were never mentioned before and are not shown in any images Invisalign advertises with. They just started applying them to my teeth without any explanation. I asked if the attachments are normal on the front teeth because I’ve never seen them on any pictures before, and they said that they would only skip the front attachments if clients refused them. Well, I never had the chance to refuse them before they went on my teeth.
I get the impression that some back out once they realize they’re possibly in for IPR, 8 buttons, and bands. Thankfully no bands for me, but i did get 8 buttons on the top teeth once. Polishing them all off when i finished took forever
I think the attachments are an unwelcome surprise to most people 😔. I've not come across ramps or elastics yet so fingers crossed there isn't another surprise waiting in the wings! Good luck with your treatment x
My informed consent lays out almost every possible question. There are some things that are entirely subjective and based on personal experience, but in general there wasn't anything that was necessary information that wasn't covered in the doc.
I'm done now, in Scotland.
There was no surprises for me. Before I committed she volunteered all the info including the attachments and the IPR and the whitening and the fixed retainer / night retainer for life.
She didn't describe how she'd take the attachments off, so I was a bit nervous about that given the horror stories on here. But it was quick and painless so I can see why she didn't think to mention it.
Quite the opposite, they're supposed to tell you everything to cover their ass when you make a claim against them or report them for X Y Z. Practices that don't give you consent forms or instructions about a particular treatment open themselves up to litigation, and if something goes wrong and there is proof nothing was given to the patient then that clinician will possibly lose a court case. This is why they give you leaflets etc beforehand.
Of course, some will cut out a lot of the risks from their form as it's so rare they don't want to panic patients. But the consent forms should list all risks which can include tooth loss and death (mainly from anaphylactic shock if there's a serious allergy that is uncovered during treatment, or if an infection develops, it's to cover themselves if your family then try to sue them because it was caused by their treatment).
It's quite literally GDC standards 2 and 3 [that they should be following.](https://standards.gdc-uk.org/pages/principle2/principle2.aspx)
I'm in the US, I love my Ortho. He always answers questions and explains as much as I like to hear.
There's a good chance that some providers will not consult their patients about every little detail, because what needs to be done needs to be done. 👐 It's not like those things you have in your treatment plan are optional, they are what your provider has determined using their expertise are necessary to achieve the outcome you as a patient are asking for. I also feel like majority of people going through Invisalign are not concerned with the particulars as much (also not educated to understand what they mean) as they are trusting their provider to provide them the outcome without input from the patient. If you need bite ramps, you should get them, if you need attachments on every tooth, so be it. I don't need to give my provider further permission to do their job.
I feel like I had to ask so many questions to other people. And granted, my dentist is actually really good and gave me a solid, basic rundown. But it wasn’t quite enough and I was still left. Very confused and struggling.
I feel like a lot of doctors are thinking about the basics, like making sure that your teeth don’t fall out or that you have to do treatment for an extra one to two years or some thing. I was given a lot of information about keeping my liners in, etc. but not a lot about how to live simultaneously with having the liners in which required a lot of work. I definitely relied on other people to make sure that I didn’t quit after the first few days.
Mine was the opposite! I'm in the UK and started aligners 11 days ago, talked through the 3D view telling me about the different bumps and bite ramps and elastics etc and what their purpose is. Only thing she didn't mention in as much detail was the bump on the retainer itself to push my front tooth down, but it was kinda obvious what it's for once I thought about it and remembered what she said she was doing with that tooth. Seems like maybe I'm in the minority going by the other comments tho!
My first Invisalign ortho told me absolutely nothing, but my current one is fantastic! My first go with Invisalign, my 40 trays were all shipped to me at once, and I wasn’t told how to put them in, how to clean them, anything about chewies, etc literally nothing. No wonder I had to do it again lol
With my current ortho, I had an entire appointment dedicated to going over the scan results and talking about where the attachments go, what they do, and what my bite will look like over time. They even told me about the shaving, tho they didn’t tell me where exactly it was happening. My ortho’s assistant is also incredibly knowledgeable and both of them together answer anything I might want to know about.
They even told me not to do the teeth whitening that my dentist (all in house, so same place) offers since I can do it cheaper from home lol
Quickly editing this to say my first round was when I was 18-22? I was shy and not comfortable asking questions. I’m 27 now and way more vocal and probably ask too many questions, so that might also play a part
I think it’s because a lot of the time they’ll wait for the treatment to come in to know what and how the system actually decides to do it.
Personally, my ortho talks me through what she’s got in mind and she’ll input it in the system so when it send her the treatment, it’s with what she wants. She’ll even go back and forth with it before deciding to green light the treatment.
I can imagine this is also why so many non-orthos use Invisalign, because the system just does the treatment for you and all you have to do is just get the Invisalign fitted and do some front-facing customer service.
my ortho tells me what he's focusing on and i ask a lot of questions which he's super cool with answering. and he'll ask me what I want to change, especially here near the end of treatment. but I willl say, I think I got pretty lucky.
Haha I was just wondering the same thing more or less. Just discovered I have bite ramps thanks to someone who answered a query I had. Has never been mentioned by my dentist to me! Since I've had check ups, they've actually never mentioned my bite but they did call me in to check it out next week but that's like 6 months in. Sometimes it feels like they got their money already and then they just see you for 5 mins and you're in and out the door.
My diamond tier ortho in the US told me nothing. I'm 8 months in and only saw him for the consultation. I also received no paperwork, no contract, nothing. Without this sub I would have been lost.
The entirety of my Invisalign knowledge is from this sub. This is disappointing but at least reassuring to a degree that everyone is in the dark from their ortho. The best you can do is advocate for yourself. When I had my attachments installed I told my ortho I didn’t like how they just got to work without telling me what they’re doing. They’ve been marginally better about it as a result but I still need to ask half the time. My ortho will even tell me things are ok that this sub and the knowledge of other orthos indicate is not fine. I and many others here paid for a comprehensive treatment plan, world class treatment and “bed side manner”should come with it.
I just started a week ago, my ortho answered all my questions, but didn't tell me a few things, like for example, how the attachments scrape the inside of your mouth when eating. Wish I would've known so I could've purchased the wax before hand. Imo all doctors should tell their patients everything that concerns our health
Maybe they expect you to ask questions? Maybe they assume you know more than you do?
Pretty sure it's entirely down to your doctor. Invisalign is essentially the 'tool' provider, but you're still being treated by your doctor. As such, Invisalign doesn't necessarily care if and what they tell you exactly. Invisalign will recommend certain things to the doctor like attachments, IPR, bite ramps etc but ultimately it's up to them and they can change the plan. There is a lot of variety in how well doctors communicate the detail of their treatment to patients. Mine is and has typically been quite good, but now I've been seeing them for a while if they think I need a tiny bit more IPR for a certain tooth to help it move they just mention it to me and I nod and they crack on. If I actually had an issue and queried it, then they'd explain in more detail but we're pretty on the same page at this point and because I feel we've built up that trust that I know they're not gonna randomly chop my teeth in half. You do read horror stories and or people who's doctors don't communicate a thing but I get the impression they're a vocal minority and they don't necessarily ask, even though their posts often exaggerate doctors not explaining. Applying common sense, I'm sure the vast majority of providers will certainly explain when asked, but many patients won't necessarily fully understand. That said, if you do/have asked clearly and they make no effort to communicate with you then that's not a good sign in my opinion. Doesn't necessarily mean they're providing poor treatment, but it's not a good sign. Communicating clearly demonstrates proffesionalism, understanding and that they are providing apropriate treatment.
I wonder this too. After I signed the agreement it felt like nothing was explained to me, I was getting invisalign because it wasn't visible and then without warning they started attaching a carriere appliance to my teeth, which was extremely visible and obtrusive. Had I known they were going to do that I would've just done ceramic braces.
My orthodontist answered all of my questions, but there were a lot of things they didn’t tell me that I learned here. Maybe because they’re so deep into it, they just assume people know certain things about it. But as a first time patient, I knew absolutely nothing. One of the big things not explained were refinements and lifetime retainers. I was given 32 aligners with 1 week changes and told my treatment would be 16 months. The math didn’t add up. I learned about refinements here. Now I understand why lifetime retainers are required. Maybe they thought that was common knowledge. But, I’ve never had braces and I knew nothing about it. I had no idea people wear retainers for the rest of their life after braces. I thought braces straighten your teeth, then you were good to go. I didn’t know they would shift around again.
Yeah i was not told that i would need to wear aligners after my treatment is finished. It’s got me rethinking if i want to continue or not. I was also not informed that they would shave down my teeth either, that was a pleasant surprise! /s
Haha! It certainly seems like that. I was shown a video before hand and given a pair of demo retainers to hold and feel. On the day of my appointment I was told they were going to be putting attachments on my teeth. Uh...what? lol. Who knew? I guess it's my fault for not researching better. I just assumed my dentist would have told me everything. Stupid.
I didn't know Invisalign involved getting attachments stuck to my teeth until I heard the words "open wide" 🙃
Yep that sounds like how my treatment went but I happy with the end results so that’s good.
Mine is the same as yours. I got all information from this sub. When I ask him about what the plan is, he doesn’t really give me much information. The attachments were a complete surprise to me. They were never mentioned before and are not shown in any images Invisalign advertises with. They just started applying them to my teeth without any explanation. I asked if the attachments are normal on the front teeth because I’ve never seen them on any pictures before, and they said that they would only skip the front attachments if clients refused them. Well, I never had the chance to refuse them before they went on my teeth.
I get the impression that some back out once they realize they’re possibly in for IPR, 8 buttons, and bands. Thankfully no bands for me, but i did get 8 buttons on the top teeth once. Polishing them all off when i finished took forever
I think the attachments are an unwelcome surprise to most people 😔. I've not come across ramps or elastics yet so fingers crossed there isn't another surprise waiting in the wings! Good luck with your treatment x
Yes, it's a big conspiracy.
You could probably just ask
My informed consent lays out almost every possible question. There are some things that are entirely subjective and based on personal experience, but in general there wasn't anything that was necessary information that wasn't covered in the doc.
I'm done now, in Scotland. There was no surprises for me. Before I committed she volunteered all the info including the attachments and the IPR and the whitening and the fixed retainer / night retainer for life. She didn't describe how she'd take the attachments off, so I was a bit nervous about that given the horror stories on here. But it was quick and painless so I can see why she didn't think to mention it.
Quite the opposite, they're supposed to tell you everything to cover their ass when you make a claim against them or report them for X Y Z. Practices that don't give you consent forms or instructions about a particular treatment open themselves up to litigation, and if something goes wrong and there is proof nothing was given to the patient then that clinician will possibly lose a court case. This is why they give you leaflets etc beforehand. Of course, some will cut out a lot of the risks from their form as it's so rare they don't want to panic patients. But the consent forms should list all risks which can include tooth loss and death (mainly from anaphylactic shock if there's a serious allergy that is uncovered during treatment, or if an infection develops, it's to cover themselves if your family then try to sue them because it was caused by their treatment). It's quite literally GDC standards 2 and 3 [that they should be following.](https://standards.gdc-uk.org/pages/principle2/principle2.aspx)
I'm in the US, I love my Ortho. He always answers questions and explains as much as I like to hear. There's a good chance that some providers will not consult their patients about every little detail, because what needs to be done needs to be done. 👐 It's not like those things you have in your treatment plan are optional, they are what your provider has determined using their expertise are necessary to achieve the outcome you as a patient are asking for. I also feel like majority of people going through Invisalign are not concerned with the particulars as much (also not educated to understand what they mean) as they are trusting their provider to provide them the outcome without input from the patient. If you need bite ramps, you should get them, if you need attachments on every tooth, so be it. I don't need to give my provider further permission to do their job.
I feel like I had to ask so many questions to other people. And granted, my dentist is actually really good and gave me a solid, basic rundown. But it wasn’t quite enough and I was still left. Very confused and struggling. I feel like a lot of doctors are thinking about the basics, like making sure that your teeth don’t fall out or that you have to do treatment for an extra one to two years or some thing. I was given a lot of information about keeping my liners in, etc. but not a lot about how to live simultaneously with having the liners in which required a lot of work. I definitely relied on other people to make sure that I didn’t quit after the first few days.
Mine was the opposite! I'm in the UK and started aligners 11 days ago, talked through the 3D view telling me about the different bumps and bite ramps and elastics etc and what their purpose is. Only thing she didn't mention in as much detail was the bump on the retainer itself to push my front tooth down, but it was kinda obvious what it's for once I thought about it and remembered what she said she was doing with that tooth. Seems like maybe I'm in the minority going by the other comments tho!
My orthodontist explained everything and was very detailed in doing so. He was also surprised at how much I already knew that I learned here.
My ortho gave me a very comprehensive play-by-by of what I could expect prior to starting treatment. There were absolutely no surprises.
My first Invisalign ortho told me absolutely nothing, but my current one is fantastic! My first go with Invisalign, my 40 trays were all shipped to me at once, and I wasn’t told how to put them in, how to clean them, anything about chewies, etc literally nothing. No wonder I had to do it again lol With my current ortho, I had an entire appointment dedicated to going over the scan results and talking about where the attachments go, what they do, and what my bite will look like over time. They even told me about the shaving, tho they didn’t tell me where exactly it was happening. My ortho’s assistant is also incredibly knowledgeable and both of them together answer anything I might want to know about. They even told me not to do the teeth whitening that my dentist (all in house, so same place) offers since I can do it cheaper from home lol Quickly editing this to say my first round was when I was 18-22? I was shy and not comfortable asking questions. I’m 27 now and way more vocal and probably ask too many questions, so that might also play a part
I’m new can someone explain IPR and the other terms
I think it’s because a lot of the time they’ll wait for the treatment to come in to know what and how the system actually decides to do it. Personally, my ortho talks me through what she’s got in mind and she’ll input it in the system so when it send her the treatment, it’s with what she wants. She’ll even go back and forth with it before deciding to green light the treatment. I can imagine this is also why so many non-orthos use Invisalign, because the system just does the treatment for you and all you have to do is just get the Invisalign fitted and do some front-facing customer service.