Technology

Sorting Through Dental Technology

New technology, new techniques and new materials constantly challenge the dental profession. Sorting these out and selecting the best is a consistent endeavor for any quality dentist. The question, "Will this yield a better result for my patient?" is the best measuring stick to use when determining whether or not to include some new technology in a dental practice.

Much of the newest technology is presented to the dental profession before it's truly ready. To compensate for it's inadequacies, the manufacturers try to sell their product from a marketing standpoint instead of practicality. an excellent example of this is the dental laser. What a dream come true for a patient. No drilling sound and the decay just gets "zapped" away. These laser dental drills are available today but fall way short in practicality. They can be used to "zap" decay but the dentist still has to use the drill to shape the tooth to accept a filling. The laser cannot remove an old filling cut off an old crown, shape teeth for porcelain veneers or even smooth a biting surface. Where is the advantage in that? I have been told by some of these manufacturers that if I buy one I should really market it so that I attract new patients even though I wouldn't really use it. They told me "People love lasers!" but I realized this wasn't going to give my patients a better result, so I passed.

The following technologies are ones that did measure up and do yield better results for our patients.

Digital X-rays

no more little pieces of film inside your mouth. Just placing a small sensor in place of the film allows the dentist to take x-rays that are instantly displayed on a computer screen. Only one fourth of the radiation is used and the images yield better quality information than regular film. You can magnify them, invert them or make them color. No chemicals are used for developing which saves the environment. The patient and dentist can view the x-ray together because its up on a large computer screen.

ShadeVision

This is a technology that allows for color scanning of teeth. Have you every seen someone with a cap or crown on their front tooth and you could tell from a mile away that it doesn't match their other teeth? Until just recently, dentists had to use little colored shade tabs and try to figure out what color porcelain the dental laboratory should use when making the new crown. Unfortunately, this left a lot up to the interpretation of the dentist or assistant and very often was wrong. The new ShadeVision system works with the same technology that matches paint color. A scanner is placed over the tooth and it records color data. That data is emailed to the dental laboratory and they use it to make a perfectly matched crown.

Diagnodent

Every day, dentists perform exams and miss decay on their patient's teeth. This decay is usually in deep grooves where the dentist cannot reach with his dental pick. The decay can grow in size and go undetected, even from x-rays. A new instrument called Diagnodent changes all of this. A laser is beamed into these deep grooves and if tooth decay is present, the instrument will detect it. The dentist can then clean out the decay and place what is usually a substantially smaller filling that he would of if he waited for detection with the pick

e.max crowns

Ever notice someone with a crown or cap on their tooth and there is a dark gray area at the gum line? The support metal that is underneath the porcelain causes this gray area. For over twenty years, dental ceramic manufacturers marketed "metal free" crowns to dentists. The problem has always been durability. The metal free crowns fractured more easily and did not fit on the prepared tooth as well. Now there is a new system called Procera that cures this problem. Instead of having a metal support, the crown has a white cast support that is as strong as metal. The crowns can be made with the same strength as the ones with metal and no ugly gray area.

Choosing what technologies to include into a dental practice is challenging. Keeping the patient's best interest in mind makes things a lot easier. The next time you see a big neon sign in a dentist's window that reads "LASER DRILL", think about who's best interest that dentist has in mind; the patient's or his own.