Dr Catherine McCanny from St Michaels Orthodontics in Wakefield appears on the MyFaceMyBody TV Show
I haven’t been to an orthodontist since I was kid. But I’m really interested to find out how orthodontics has changed and some of the options that St. Michaels offers to their patients. Let`s go check it out.Well, we are here in Wakefield in a beautiful orthodontic practice. I mean it looks absolutely amazing as soon as you walk through the door. How long have you been established for now? Well, we’ve been established for fifteen years but the practice and the demand for orthodontics has grown so rapidly and we, this is our third extension, which we completed last January. Yep, it’s like coming in the first feel of the clinic is like coming into a beautiful hotel reception area. And then, obviously, the clinic rooms are fantastic.So, you really, I suppose patient comfort is one of the key things.
I wanted patients to come in and feel totally relaxed and comfortable. and I designed it such that, you know, it would feel more like a homely feel to it rather than a very clinical feel.
When I was younger I had the fixed braces, the big metal braces. Is that what people still have today, or what is available? Well, the fixed braces, a lot of our teenage children love these for example.
These ones here, yeah.
Yeah, these. The colors on it, and.
Oh, I wasn’t allowed colors.
Oh, yeah, the very.
Oh. So they get great fun and excitement when they come in and choosing their colours. As the adult market has grown, and more and more adults are now having orthodontic treatment, we offer now a much bigger scope of cosmetic braces, including the more cosmetic fixed braces. And a very popular treatment choice for adults is Invisalign, and Invisalign is virtually invisible.
It’s a series of clear plastic aligning braces which gently move the teeth into position. and when these are in place, people don’t even really notice you are wearing a brace, so this is very popular with a lot of our adult patients.
What are the typical male patients you see coming into your clinic?
There certainly has been a big increase in the number of males coming now for treatment and yes, generally they do go for more cosmetic options and Invisalign is very popular with them. And age range you know, generally by 30 to 50, but we’ve even treated a gentleman…he was in his late ’60s. And he said it was the best thing he’d ever done.
So, you’re seeing more adults coming in and asking for their teeth straightened and…
Absolutely I mean the market has just grown in a phenomenal rate over, over the least few years and we get a lot of parents who have seen the difference that we`ve made to their children. They see them not only having lovely, straight teeth, but the difference in their self-confidence and in their selfesteem. And then they say, well I want this done.
So we do get a lot of parents coming back for treatment when they see what results they can achieve with What motivated you to get braces in the first place?
Well, it was a couple of years ago. I’m at school now, and it was almost a fashion trend to have a brace. Everyone was having straight teeth. Everyone was, it was almost like a must do thing to have these straight teeth.
Did you have the colored ones or did you have just the straight ones?
Yeah. Yeah, I mixed and matched the colors all the time to go with like, it was the Olympics I remember. I had my brace so I had red, white, and blue, I believe.
Oh, fantastic. Look at that picture. Okay. Oh, fantastic.
Yeah.
Would you recommend sort of having orthodontic treatment at an early stage?
Speaker: Absolutely, absolutely. It puts you in steady, makes you confident for the rest of your life, interviews, applying for things. It just makes you smile.
