Taken from the London Evening Standard [ link ]

So, is it safe to bleach your teeth?

'Catherine Zeta-Jones has got it, so too have Liz Hurley, Cindy Crawford, Britney Spears and any wannabe starlet. Now the Hollywood Smile, aka tooth-whitening, is the one cosmetic procedure which the British are taking up in hordes. Last year 100,000 people tried tooth-whitening treatments.

The biggest rise has been in the number of dentists offering 'power whitening' a technque in which the teeth are painted with hydrogen peroxide gel and then subjected to a stron light which accelrates the bleaching action. It takes less than an hour, costs about £600, and can lighten teeth by 10 shades.

But this week, the British Dental association point out that dentist who offer 'power whitening' are breaking the law by using almost 400 times the amount of hydrogen peroxide as the law permits. there is no evidence that high doses of bleach are unsafe, but the BDA feels that, in time, patient complaints will filter through, and result in prosecutions for dentists. So how safe is tooth whitening?

Safe as houses, according to any dentist you care to ask. Dr Phil Stemmer, of the Teeth for Life centre in Devonshire Place, W1, says: 'In virtually ever country that uses it, bleaching caaied out in a dentist's surgery is regarded as a medical procedure. It is considered so safe that there is no recommended limit on the amount of Hydrogen pexoride that a dentist can use. In Britain, it is classified as a cosmetic device, and in terms of products for cosmetic use, the law says that 0.1 per cent hydrogen peroxide is the maximum. If you put that concentration of hydrogen peroxide on teeth, it will have a negligible effect.'

Dr Stemmer uses 35 per cent hydrogen peroxide in his power-whitening treatments, which he has used on Sadie Frost, Jude Law and Patsy Kensit. 'The method does not remove enamel, damage teeth, or increase susceptibility to gum disease,' he says,

'Hydrogen peroxide has been used - safely' - for whitening teeth for 56 years,' says Mervyn Druin of The ondon Centre for Cosmetic Dentistry, who has whitened the teeth of the Appleton sisters. 'This law makes British dentists a laughing stock abroad.

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