From those dusts, these muds. Dental professionals are now once again attacking advertisements and social media campaigns about invisible aligners that promise perfect teeth in record time and at a single price. An issue that has been going on since at least 2017, when the first complaints were filed, and that is now returning to the present.
Because? Óscar Castro Reino, president of the General Council of Dentists of Spain, responds. “Now we are reaping what we have sown,” he says. Visits to dentist offices throughout Spain are increasing with patients “who have suffered damage when using, at their own risk, those dental aligners that are offered online,” says Castro.
“An outrage,” he continues, “because this would be the same as receiving a scalpel and some gauze at home so that one could operate on oneself for appendicitis.”
The problem, Spanish dentists lament, is that the control by the Spanish Agency for Medicines and Health Products (Aemps) of these companies, “the majority of which are based outside of Spain, has no effect.
And if one manages to close, they reopen under another name,” adds the president of the dentists of Spain. Castro confirms, however, that he knows that the courts are already processing dozens, if not hundreds, of complaints from individuals dissatisfied with these treatments. The most common problem is tooth loss.
These companies, many of which use influencers to sell their product, “offer and distribute these aligners without the supervision of a dentist and without the need to follow up in a consultation.” And they use the bombardment of messages that promise “perfect white teeth.” So we should not be surprised, adds Óscar Castro, “at the increase in lesions in the mouth that we are detecting.”
When there is a first visit, Castro reveals, this attention is usually done in collegiate consultations, “which give up their facilities and devices.” It is behavior, he adds, “very questionable.”
And once this procedure has been completed (the mouth design has been completed), “a treatment is scheduled that the patient follows autonomously at home. They send photos through an application and those companies tell them the next steps to follow.”
Dr. Smile is one of the companies (there are many more) highlighted. His spokesperson in Spain responds to La Vanguardia: “We regret this situation. We work to improve every day, we incorporate new protocols and update our quality standards.
We actively monitor each treatment and respond to our patients’ requests, we analyze each case carefully to offer the best experience and service that adapts to the needs of our patients,” he says.
Since Dr. Smile arrived in Spain in 2019, “more than 30,000 patients have endorsed our invisible orthodontics,” adds this spokesperson. He ensures that he has a “patient care” service and “in-person visits to the dentist are scheduled, in addition to having online consultations with a medical team and support through an application on the mobile phone.”
