Bob Conte This is a case that I may have handled very differently if I were a traditional impression-taking, send-it-to-the-lab kind of dentist. This patient was referred by a long time patient who has referred dozens of patients to our practice over the years. This gentleman is a veteran who served in Iraq the first time around. He fell on hard times and obviously has not cared for his teeth. He is in the process of putting his life back together and requested to have his teeth fixed so he could feel better about himself and get a job.
I did the case at no cost to the patient as he did not have the kind of finances to even afford a removable appliance.
Visit 1: 2 hours. Prepared the maxillary arch for full coverage crowns #7-#10. This was done in the InLab software as I wanted to splint #9 and #10 and take advantage of the anatomical connectors found in the software. This could have easily been done in Chairside. Designed, milled and cemented the provisional. Pt dismissed.
Visit 2: 2 hours. Prepared the mandibular arch for full coverage crowns #23-#26. Imaged and designed the provisional. While the provisional was milling, delivered the maxillary crowns. Cement the provisional and the patient was dismissed.
Visit 3: 45 minutes. Remove the provisional and deliver the lower crowns. Because of the accuracy of the system, there were zero adjustments needed.
This case required under 5 hours of chair time and the lab cost to the practice was the price of eight emax blocks. Quite honestly, I may have approached this case a little differently if working with a lab. The lab fees would have been in the area of $1,000.00. We were able to contain cost. The milling, characterizing and crystallizing were done during non-patient hours. This man was quite happy and I think we made a difference.
