KATY, Texas – James Viscardi works diligently in his backyard garden.
Viscardi, a retired mailman for the United States Postal Service, is a father and grandfather, and he loves working out in the garden because it’s one of the few places where he can be completely alone and not have to worry about talking to people.
Or smiling or showing his horrendous teeth.
Teeth falling apart
For five years, Viscardi's mouth has been a disaster area, with most of his teeth falling apart and breaking in half.
"Sometimes while eating, I will all of a sudden feel something strange in my mouth, and it will turn out to be one of my teeth, a tooth that has broken in half, and I’m like, 'What is that?'” Viscardi said.
Worsening condition
The problems associated with Viscardi's dental disaster have only gotten worse over the years.
There's the physical pain of trying to chew hard food and the psychological pain of not wanting to talk to people because he will have to open his mouth.
Up until now, Viscardi had been told his only hope was to have full mouth reconstruction with dental implants.
The implants come at a price Viscardi could never even dream of paying.
"I was looking around, and the prices are, like, $40,000 to $70,000 for full implants," Viscardi said.
Call to Spencer Solves It
Faced with spending the rest of his life not smiling, Viscardi called Spencer Solves It for help.
Right away, we contacted one of Houston’s most respected and admired dentists, Dr. Terri Alani.
After examining Viscardi's mouth, Alani summed up the problems.
"Well, it would take a lot of dollars to fix this man’s mouth because basically every single tooth is broken down," Alani said.
Solution
Knowing Viscardi's financial position, Alani proposed a solution.
She custom-fitted him for a revolutionary, new dental appliance called Snap-On Smile.
It’s an appliance that's made from the same material as the space shuttle. It fits right over existing teeth and provides a movie star-like smile.
While wearing it, you can eat and drink, and you can take it off whenever you need to.
It simply snaps into place over your existing teeth and requires no surgical work of any kind.
Game-changer
Now, Dr. Alani goes about fitting James for his custom fit, Snap-On Smile and the order goes out to the laboratory where the device will be built.
Weeks later, the Snap-on Smile is delivered to Dr. Alani and it’s time to put it over James' teeth and show him his brand-new look.
“So now it’s the big moment James, are you all set,” I say.
With that, Dr. Alani snaps both the upper and lower dental appliance comfortably into James’ mouth and hands him a mirror to see for the first time what he now looks like.
“Oh man! Oh, maaaannnnnnn! Look at that,” James says, shaking his head in disbelief.
"All I can say is, thank you, Bill (Spencer), so very much. Getting my teeth done this way will change my life. It really will change everything for me," Viscardi said.
We at KPRC 2 and Spencer Solves It want to thank Dr. Terri Alani for all of her generosity in providing all of this work absolutely free to benefit James Viscardi.