Hollywood Smile in Turkey

The defining feature is that the result is designed, not accumulated. Your dentist works from photographs and a digital smile design to decide tooth proportions, the shape of the edges, the midline and the curve of the smile line against your lip, then the laboratory makes every unit to that plan. That is why a Hollywood smile looks coherent in a way that individual crowns placed over years never quite do.

Veneers or crowns?

• Veneers: a thin shell, roughly 0.3–0.7 mm, bonded to the front of the tooth. Requires removing a small amount of enamel. Suitable when the underlying teeth are healthy and reasonably aligned.
• Crowns: cover the whole tooth and require far more reduction — typically 1–2 mm all round. Needed when a tooth is heavily filled, root-treated, broken down or significantly out of line.
• Most Hollywood smiles are a mix. Your dentist decides tooth by tooth, and should be able to tell you exactly which of yours need which.

Materials

What the package includes

• Full examination, panoramic X-ray and 3D scan
• Digital smile design and a trial mock-up
• All veneers or crowns in your chosen material
• Temporary teeth for the week between fittings
• All laboratory work and fitting appointments
• Six nights in a four-star hotel with breakfast
• All airport, hotel and clinic transfers
• A personal English-speaking coordinator
• A night guard where grinding is a factor
• Five-year guarantee on materials and workmanship

What is not included

Flights are excluded so you can book your own. Treatment needed before the veneers can be placed — root canals, extractions, implants, gum treatment or bone grafting — is quoted separately once your X-rays have been reviewed. This is the most common reason a quote changes, which is why Valentmedica asks for a panoramic X-ray before giving you a figure rather than after you arrive.

A Hollywood smile is usually suitable if

• You have discoloured teeth that whitening has not improved, such as tetracycline staining.
• Your teeth are worn, chipped, uneven in size or shape, or have old discoloured fillings at the front.
• You have small gaps or mild crowding you do not want to fix with orthodontics.
• You already have crowns or veneers that need replacing.
• Your gums are healthy, or any gum disease has been treated first.
• You accept that preparing the teeth is permanent.

You may need to wait, or consider something else

• You have untreated gum disease or active decay — both must be dealt with first.
• Your teeth are significantly crooked: orthodontics gives a better and far more conservative result.
• Only the colour bothers you and your teeth are otherwise healthy: whitening is cheaper, quicker and removes nothing.
• You grind your teeth heavily and will not wear a night guard — grinding is the fastest way to break ceramic.
• You are under 18, or your gums have not finished maturing.

Take the one-minute self-check below for an honest answer, or send photographs and a panoramic X-ray for a free assessment by a Valentmedica dentist before you commit to anything.

1. Digital smile design: photographs, video of you speaking and smiling, and a 3D scan are used to design the proportions. The smile line is matched to your lower lip, and the midline to your face rather than to your teeth.
2. Mock-up: the proposed design is tried on your teeth in temporary material so you can see the shape and length before anything is removed. Ask for this — it is the last fully reversible step.
3. Preparation: under local anaesthetic, each tooth is reduced by the amount that material requires — a fraction of a millimetre for a veneer, considerably more for a crown.
4. Impressions: digital scans or silicone impressions record the prepared teeth, the opposing teeth and how your bite closes.
5. Shade selection: taken in natural daylight with your dentist. Darker necks and more translucent edges are what make a result read as teeth rather than as tiles.
6. Temporaries: hand-made temporary teeth are fitted so you can eat, speak and judge the length over the following days.
7. Laboratory work: a technician mills or presses each unit, then layers and characterises it by hand. This takes two to three days and is where the money actually goes.
8. Trial fit: units are placed without cement and checked for fit, contact, bite and appearance. Changes are made now, not after bonding.
9. Bonding: each unit is etched, the tooth is prepared and the restoration is bonded with resin cement and cured. The bite is refined and the margins polished.

• Days 1–3: gum tenderness around the margins and sensitivity to hot and cold, which is normal after preparation. Simple painkillers are enough.
• Week 1: sensitivity settles. Eat softer food and avoid very hot or very cold drinks while it does.
• Weeks 1–2: your tongue adjusts to the new tooth length and shape. A slight lisp is common at first and almost always resolves as you adapt.
• Weeks 2–4: the bite settles. If anything feels high or catches when you close, contact your coordinator — a small adjustment takes minutes and prevents a fracture later.
• Month 1 onwards: fully normal function. The guarantee is only valid if you attend routine check-ups and hygienist appointments at home.

Valentmedica works with licensed dental clinics in Istanbul whose dentists are registered with the Turkish Ministry of Health, and which run their own laboratories, so adjustments happen in hours rather than days. You are given your dentist's name and registration number before you pay anything.

Risks you should know about

• Irreversible enamel loss: the teeth will need covering permanently from now on.
• Nerve damage: deep preparation can inflame the pulp, and a small proportion of prepared teeth later need root canal treatment.
• Sensitivity: usually temporary, occasionally long-lasting.
• Chipping or fracture: particularly in grinders, and the main reason a night guard is fitted.
• Gum recession: over the years this can expose a margin at the gum line.
• Bite problems: a poorly adjusted bite causes jaw ache and accelerates wear.
• Debonding: a veneer can come off and usually needs re-bonding.
• Colour mismatch: ceramic does not change colour, so any remaining natural teeth will drift away from it over time.

Ask for your treatment plan, X-rays and material certificates in writing before you fly home. They matter if your dentist at home ever has to work on these teeth, and Valentmedica provides them as standard.

Sequence is everything in dentistry. Gum disease is treated before anything else; implants and bone grafts need months to integrate before a crown goes on; gum contouring is done before impressions so the laboratory works to the final gum line. A clinic that does these in the wrong order produces a result that fails early.

Commonly combined with

• Gum contouring: reshaping the gum line, usually with a laser, where a gummy smile would otherwise make the teeth look short. Done before impressions.
• Teeth whitening: used on the lower teeth so they match the new uppers, if you are only treating the upper arch.
• Dental implants: for missing teeth. These need 3–6 months to integrate, so a full plan involving implants is two trips.
• Root canal treatment: where a tooth is already infected or the nerve is compromised by preparation.
• Night guard: not optional if you grind.

If your plan needs implants, be sceptical of any clinic that promises to finish everything in one week. Bone takes months to integrate around an implant, and nothing shortens that.

• Panoramic X-ray: have one taken at home and send it before paying a deposit. It is the only way to get a quote that will not change.
• Existing dental work: tell your dentist about old root canals, crowns, implants and any tooth that has ever been painful.
• Medication: mention blood thinners and bisphosphonates in particular, which matter if an extraction is needed.
• Shade: look at real examples rather than renders, and decide how white is too white for your skin tone and age. A shade that photographs well can look conspicuous in person.
• Packing list: soft foods for the temporary phase, your regular medication, and a toothbrush with soft bristles.

What fails first is almost never the ceramic. It is the tooth underneath and the gum around it. Decay at the margin, gum recession exposing an edge, or a fractured unit in a patient who grinds are the realistic failure modes, and all three are far more about daily care than about the material you chose.

Treat them like natural teeth with slightly more respect: brush twice daily, floss or use interdental brushes around every margin, see a hygienist twice a year, and do not open packaging or bite nails with your front teeth. Choose shade carefully — a slightly warmer, more translucent result ages much better than the brightest option, as you can see across the cases in our dental before and after gallery.