Will leaving your Invisalign aligners unattended for 3 months or longer, damage your teeth or affect treatment outcomes?

Once you’ve reached your last batch of aligners at home, we advise that you give us a call. Your Invisalign plan may allow us to provide you with additional aligners so that your treatment can remain active. These can be sent to you or we can arrange for you to pick them up.

Often, however, before the next aligners can be fitted, interproximal reduction (IPR) and/or further attachments are required. If this is the case, it’s not advisable to issue further aligners. Without IPR they would feel too tight and without attachments they would feel too loose. In these circumstances, we advise that you simply continue to wear your last aligners. If these become too stained and ‘tired’ then it’s ok just to wear them in bed at night, providing you do so every night. They’ll simply be acting as ‘retainers’ to hold your teeth in their current position. By doing this we’ll be able to pick up your treatment at the point it was temporarily halted. It’s also very unlikely to affect your expected treatment outcomes. Providing you keep your teeth and aligners very clean, your aligners won’t be causing any damage to your teeth and gums during this time.