SmileDirectClub: anyone try it?

April 28, 2017 2:02 PM

I'm seeing a lot of ads for SmileDirectClub, and it's so much cheaper than going the braces route. Have any of you tried it?

They also seem to take insurance, give your initial money back if your teeth are too messed up to fix (mine might very well be), and accept FSA dough. All without going to creepy appointments every so often.

I've been wearing Warby Parker glasses for years, so I know that this kinda thing can work. But I'm curious: is this a scam? Have any of you tried it successfully? Failed miserably?

Thanks in advance!

posted by hardlikealgebra to Health & Fitness (3 answers total)

Best answer: Yeah, most braces cost more than $2k--and most cases are also substantially more than this sort of thing can reliably fix. They're aligners, not braces, and they lack the more advanced things that Invisalign has been doing lately that lets them cover more complicated cases, I think? You might try Googling about Invisalign to see some of the issues there. I think they're more intended for people whose teeth have drifted a bit since they had braces as kids than for people with noticeable issues--they're expensive versions of retainers, not cheap versions of braces. If you think of them that way, they no longer seem so cheap as to be a scam. I can't speak to personal experience because I looked into it and realized I was almost certainly not going to get decent results out of a product like this, and I even did have braces when I was younger... I just have more than the standard mid-30s drift.
posted by Sequence at 2:48 PM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

SmileDirectClub can't fix the same stuff traditional braces or Invisalign can. For example, many people with Invisalign need to have attachments (basically little bumps) put on their teeth to help the trays pull the teeth to the correct position. Most patients also require IPR (filing between teeth) to allow the teeth to turn and move more freely.
posted by Amanda B at 4:57 PM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thanks, ya'll. Bummer, tho.
posted by hardlikealgebra at 11:32 AM on May 1, 2017