Meet
Dr. Thompson.

Her training and background

Dr. Thompson earned her bachelor's degree from the University of California, Los Angeles and her Doctorate of Dental Surgery from Howard University, where she also completed her orthodontic residency. Howard's College of Dentistry is one of the country's longest-running institutions for training oral health practitioners, a program with deep roots in evidence-based clinical practice, which is where Dr. Thompson learned to favor the conservative options first.

She has been practicing orthodontics since 2001, which puts her clinical experience comfortably past the 25-year mark. South Pasadena is where she chose to put down roots, and where SmileHaus has stayed ever since.

How Dr. Thompson practices

The SmileHaus approach is straightforward and intentionally a little old-fashioned: every patient is seen by Dr. Thompson personally at every visit. There's no rotation of associate doctors, no handoff to a hygienist for the meaningful conversations. If your treatment plan changes, Dr. Thompson is the person explaining why.

She's also conservative about when to recommend treatment, particularly for children. If a child is too young to benefit from early intervention, Dr. Thompson will say so and ask you to come back in a year. That's the right answer more often than parents expect, and it's the answer you'll get here regardless of what a different office may have told you.

For adults, the conversation is different but the principles are the same. Many adult patients arrive a little embarrassed about the timing, feeling like braces are something they should have handled at 14. Dr. Thompson doesn't make that weird. A meaningful percentage of the practice's adult work is fixing imperfect childhood orthodontics or prepping teeth for a major milestone, and both are completely normal reasons to start now rather than never.

What to expect when you meet Dr. Thompson

Honestly, the first visit is mostly a conversation. Dr. Thompson will take a look, listen to what's brought you in, and walk you through the options that actually apply to your case. If braces or aligners aren't the right call right now, she'll tell you. If they are, she'll explain the trade-offs in plain language and answer the questions you didn't know to ask. That hesitation a lot of adults feel about getting started? It makes sense. Most of it dissolves once you have real information instead of guesses.

Treatments Dr. Thompson offers

Dr. Thompson chose her clinical toolkit deliberately rather than carrying every product a sales rep walked in with. The three options she works with are:

• Pitts21 PRO System, a modern self-ligating bracket system from OC Orthodontics. Smaller and lower-profile than the braces you may remember, with shorter chair time at adjustment visits. This is the flagship treatment at SmileHaus.
• Spark™ Clear Aligners, nearly invisible removable aligners (Ormco TruGEN) for adults and mature teens with mild to moderate cases who want a treatment they can take out for meals and events.
• Early treatment for children , a growth-respecting approach where Dr. Thompson watches what's developing and intervenes only when intervening genuinely helps. Often the recommendation is "not yet" , and that's a feature, not a hedge.

Notably absent: Invisalign (Spark is the clear-aligner choice here now), and the bespoke-lingual systems that don't fit the practice's clinical philosophy. Fewer products, more focus on the ones that work.

Recognitions and professional memberships

In 2025, Dr. Thompson was named to Los Angeles Top Orthodontists, a peer-recognition list that pulls from clinician surveys across the LA basin. She is an active member of every major professional society that matters in the field:

• American Dental Association
• California Dental Society
• San Gabriel Valley Dental Society
• American Association of Orthodontists
• California Association of Orthodontists
• Pacific Coast Society of Orthodontists

Outside the office, Dr. Thompson enjoys travel, tennis, yoga, and home improvement projects. Your complimentary consultation is exactly that , complimentary. No commitment, no pressure, just clarity on what's possible. Schedule yours →