Treatments

Everything you need, under one roof.

General care, hygiene, implants and orthodontics from the same team, in the same building, so nobody hands you a referral letter and a six-month wait. Every plan arrives written, itemised and fixed before we start.

Dental implants Clear aligners Bonding & whitening Hygiene & periodontal care Crowns, veneers & onlays Anxious patients

A dental radiograph used for implant planning

Dental implants

Single teeth to full arches, guided by CT planning. Placement, restoration and aftercare all in-house.

An implant is a titanium root placed into the jaw and left to integrate before anything is put on top of it. We plan every one from a CT scan rather than a flat radiograph, because the thing that matters is the bone you cannot see on a flat image.

Placement and restoration are both done here, by Dr Rhys Meredith. That matters more than it sounds: when the surgeon and the person making the crown are the same person, the crown is designed around where the implant actually went rather than where it was supposed to go.

Healing takes three to six months depending on the site and whether we grafted. You are not left with a gap in the meantime, a temporary is fitted the same day in almost every case.

CT planned 10-year review

From £2,650

Does it hurt?

Placement is done under local anaesthetic and most patients describe it as easier than an extraction. Sedation is available if you would prefer it.

How long do they last?

The published figures are around 95% still in service at ten years. Ours are reviewed at ten years as a matter of course and the review is included.

Am I suitable?

Most people are. Smoking and uncontrolled gum disease are the two things that genuinely change the answer, and we will tell you at the assessment rather than after you have paid.

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A modern dental surgery prepared for an aligner fitting

Clear aligners

Invisalign and fixed retention for adults who were told twenty years ago that it was too late.

Aligners are a series of clear removable trays, each moving the teeth a fraction of a millimetre. They are not a compromise version of braces, for the great majority of adult cases they do the same job less visibly.

We scan rather than take impressions, and you see the predicted result on screen before you commit to anything. If you do not like what the plan produces, you have lost a scan and an hour rather than three thousand pounds.

Retention is the part nobody mentions in the advertising. Teeth move back. Every course here includes a bonded retainer behind the front teeth and a removable one on top of it, plus the first replacement free.

Digital preview 0% finance

From £3,200

How long does it take?

Most courses run six to fourteen months. We will give you the number at the planning appointment, and it comes from the scan rather than an average.

Will people notice?

Rarely, unless they are looking. The trays are worn twenty-two hours a day and taken out to eat.

Am I too old?

No. Our oldest aligner patient started at seventy-three. Bone responds at any age provided the gums are healthy.

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Bonding & whitening

Composite edge bonding and Enlighten home whitening, the conservative route to an even smile.

Edge bonding adds composite to the edges and surfaces of teeth to even out chips, wear and small gaps. Nothing is drilled away, which is the whole argument for it over veneers: if you dislike it in five years, it comes off and you are back where you started.

Whitening comes first, always, because composite cannot be whitened once it is placed. We use Enlighten home trays worn overnight for two weeks, which reaches shade B1 in the great majority of cases.

We will talk you out of this if your bite is the actual problem. Bonding on teeth that are wearing because of how they meet will chip again within a year, and the honest answer there is aligners first.

No drilling Shade B1

From £250 per tooth

Does whitening damage enamel?

No. The peroxide concentrations used in supervised whitening do not soften enamel. Sensitivity during treatment is common and temporary.

How long does bonding last?

Five to eight years before it needs polishing or replacing, depending on your bite and whether you grind.

Can I just have whitening?

Yes, and for a lot of people that is all that is needed. £595 for the full Enlighten course including trays and review.

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A treatment unit and hygiene instruments

Hygiene & periodontal care

Airflow cleaning, gum charting and a maintenance interval set by your risk, not by a diary rule.

Appointments are forty-five minutes as standard rather than the twenty that is common. That is long enough to chart the gums properly, clean below the gumline where it matters, and actually talk to you about what is causing the problem.

We use Airflow (a fine powder and water jet) for most cleaning rather than scaling alone. It is more comfortable, faster, and considerably better at biofilm than an ultrasonic scaler on its own.

Your recall interval is set by your measured risk. Some patients need three months, plenty need nine, and telling everyone six is a diary convenience rather than clinical care.

45 minutes Airflow

From £85

Is it painful?

Airflow is comfortable for most people. Where there is deeper cleaning to do we will numb the area, there is no reason to endure it.

Do I need to see a dentist too?

Yes, examinations and hygiene are separate. The plan covers two of each a year.

My gums bleed. Is that normal?

No, and it is the single most-ignored symptom in dentistry. It is the early sign of gum disease and it is reversible at that stage.

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A dental surgery set up for restorative work

Crowns, veneers & onlays

Scanned, milled and glazed by one ceramist in Kingsford who has worked with us for eleven years.

Where a tooth is too broken down for a filling, the choice is an onlay or a crown. An onlay covers part of the tooth and keeps more of it, which is almost always the better answer and almost always the one offered second elsewhere.

Everything is scanned rather than impressed, and everything goes to the same ceramist in Kingsford. Eleven years of working with one person means the shade matches first time far more often than it does with a rota of labs.

All metal-free unless there is a specific reason otherwise. Zirconia where strength matters at the back, layered porcelain where appearance matters at the front.

Digital scan Metal-free

From £850

How many visits?

Two in most cases: scan and prepare, then fit about two weeks later. A temporary is worn in between.

Will it look different?

It should look like the tooth did before it broke. We photograph the shade in daylight rather than under the surgery light.

How long do they last?

Ten to twenty years is the usual range. The failure is nearly always decay at the margin rather than the ceramic itself.

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Anxious patients

Longer visits, a stop signal that is always honoured, and IV sedation with a resident anaesthetist.

A meaningful proportion of our patients came to us having not seen a dentist for years. The first appointment for anyone in that position is a conversation in a normal room with the chair upright, and it costs nothing.

When we do treat, appointments are longer than they need to be on purpose, and there is a hand signal that stops everything immediately. It is honoured every time without discussion, that is the entire basis of getting through it.

For anything substantial we offer intravenous sedation with a resident anaesthetist. You are conscious and able to respond but remember very little afterwards. It is not a general anaesthetic and you go home the same day with someone.

IV sedation No-cost chat first

Sedation from £320

Will you judge me?

No. Nobody here is interested in how long it has been. We are interested in what to do next.

Can I just come and look?

Yes. Ask for a no-cost chat and that is exactly what you will get, no chair, no instruments.

Is sedation safe?

It is very well established and monitored throughout by an anaesthetist. We will go through your medical history in detail beforehand.

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What we will not do

Treatment we talk people out of.

Bonding on a bite that is the actual problem. Whitening on unsettled gums. Veneers on healthy teeth where edge bonding would do. Implants for a smoker who is not ready to stop, because the failure rate roughly doubles and it is unfair to take the money without saying so.

None of that is us being difficult. It is that a plan which fails in two years costs you more than the plan you did not have.

Referrals

From other practices.

We accept referrals for implant placement, sedation and complex restorative work from practices across Kingsford and the Vale. The referring practice keeps the patient, we do the specified work and send them back with a written report.

Email the referral to hello@smileharbour.co.uk or telephone 029 2018 4400 and ask for Nia.

Send a referral

Not sure what you need?

Book a ninety-minute assessment and you will leave knowing exactly what is happening, what can wait, and what each option costs.

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