Flipperlady
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I was wondering, because to read the lab magazines you would think everyone makes them now. I don't plan to go digital, should I just end my career right now?
I agree, I think it's mostly hype right now, but that's all you see in the lab publications and meetings now, there's a tremendous effort to push this through. Tom M, rest his soul, used to argue that digital could do away with relines and repairs because the denture would be on file and we could just print a new one for less cost than the repair or reline.I'm sure the dentists will have one in their offices at some point (they never pass up a new toy at the conventions, lol),however they will be in for a real surprise when they find out dentures aren't the same as full mouth crown and bridge , lol.
Its a very small minority today, but it will change rapidly over the next 2 years, there are one or two behavioral things to fix and 2 technical obstacles going from analog to digital in the lab workflow.
the real problem is compliance from the dentists. also they all want to do it with IOS ....which is not possible of course....
The printers to look at right now are Kulzer and Carbon. Kulzer is further along with their materials than anyone, (and the Cara Printer is fantastic at its price point. In some ways it outperforms our eden 260 at less than 1/5 the price!) and carbon is moving very fast, though their business model is very pricey, (they just created an 'entry level' lower monthly cost - down from 4k to 2500 - if you can live with a smaller build area.)
The Ivoclar method? It may be further along than some of the others BUT if you think milling is the way to go with removables I think you do not know much about milling....subtractive manufacturing is going to die as fast as materials and processes get in line with additive manufacturing, its just way too efficient. Nope Ivoclar is promoting digital milling of dentures to get you to buy their new line of mills and pucks because their cash cow of emax is dying so fast.
Milling is pretty wasteful as a denture option, there are a few exceptions but for the bulk of work printing will be what wins.I'm fairly ignorant on digital dentures, I thought most were milled, the ones you suggest are printed?
The denture in the pics above any seasoned denture person would smile at. Personally I do all my work in wax before I process. There is minor border trimming and then straight to polish. The denture above almost looks like a thin flexible denture with an attempt to add some tint. Maybe I'm missing something.
Again, it helps to understand what you are looking at. These are not complete products, this is one stage in the process, these “dentures” are nothing more that a printed base and a printed arch of teeth which have been placed together. Depending upon the system and process there can be several steps after this which are similar to glazing a crown, if you are familiar with fixed work this would be analogous to a bisque bake or even a framework for porcelain application.
There are subsequent steps of glazing and/or layering of translucent characterized composites to finalize the restoration.
It is in your best interest to learn about these methods now, even though they are not yet practical for daily production, because sooner or later they will be - and if you have had your head in the sand or insisted “my doctors would never except this junk” then you’re going to lose your doctors when someone else gets it right… Digital is here to stay folks if you expect to stay in this industry more than a couple years you owe it to yourself to learn about it. It’s really too late for crown and bridge people to “go digital“ but removable labs are at the beginning of that journey, take advantage of the writing on the wall that you see in the crown and bridge world already.
I understand and agree about the journey.It may not matter what I'm about to say, however, I've been in dentistry since 1987 and dentures was not a weeks long journey, it took decades. Sure you can make a denture after a few courses, however there is so much more to them that you can't put in a machine. The ones here who have done this awhile know what I'm talking about, like it's a duty to stay in the business because once this knowledge is gone (aged out) and if it isn't passed along then the public will suffer. I suspect dentures will end up like watchmaking, there are plenty of digital watches out there, but horologists are very much in demand to make watches despite talk of the end of their craft.. Like I said earlier, I will do this until there is no more need, but I'm not buying the digital.