Sameer Puri The design of the CEREC system is something that is functional and purposeful. It's size and shape allows clinicians to place the system in their operatories and move the machine around with ease. The controls (trackball and keypad) are designed so that the user wastes a minimum amount of movement when using the system. It frankly works very well as a tremendous amount of thought has been put into the process over the past 3 decades.
Every so often however, there are doctors that want to modify the design to suit their own purposes. For example, some docs do not like the trackball despite its obvious benefits. They are used to a mouse and they want to continue to use a mouse when designing restorations with the CEREC.
One of the doctors in our January advanced courses had a neat idea. Being a woodworker and a tinkerer, he decided to create a housing that would fit on his CEREC and allow him to replace the trackball with a flat surface that he can now use a mouse on.
The idea is simple- you remove the trackball, use velcro to affix the flat surface (which he made from a cutting board) and use a router to remove material on the bottom so that the pad fits over the left, center and right mouse buttons.
Now plug in a USB mouse in the machine and voila- instant track pad and mouse. Dr. Charles Sannar is the clever guy who created and patented this idea. I encouraged him to sell this little device - he can be reached at byebyetrackball@comcast.net
So simple that I hope you find helpful and handy as well.
