Clinical performance of laminate veneers: A review of the literature

Abstract

With increasing patient demand for good esthetic outcomes, restorative treatments should also focus on accomplishing excellent smile esthetics. Complete crowns, such as metal-ceramic and allceramic restorations, have been mainly used to treat an unesthetic appearance caused by tooth discoloration, defects including dental caries, undesirable old restorations, fractures, and malformation. However, tooth preparation for complete ceramic crowns involves the extensive removal of sound tooth substance, which is approximately 63%-75% of the coronal tooth substance [1,2].Laminate veneers (LVs), which were introduced in the mid-1970s [3,4], have been used widely in esthetic restorative treatments. Tooth preparation for LVs is less invasive than that for complete ceramic crowns and requires the removal of only 3%-12% of the tooth substance in the anterior tooth region [1]. Although LVs are a valid and favorable restorative treatment method, several factors can impact the clinical outcomes. These factors include tooth preparation design, condition of the abutment tooth, tooth vitality, occlusion, restorative materials, adhesive bonding procedures, and adhesive materials.The tooth preparation design for LVs can be classified into four types: (a) window, (b) feathered edge, (c) palatal chamfer, and (d) butt joint preparations, in terms of the incisal preparation design (Fig. 1)[5,6]. Window and feathered edge preparations are referred to as nonoverlap incisal preparations, whereas palatal chamfer and butt joint preparations are referred to as overlap incisal preparations.