Case study with Cerec/Laser

Here's an actual patient case description that we recently completed in our Folsom office that demonstrates how far dentistry has advanced in just the last few years. A patient presented with two broken teeth in the lower right area. She had just completed a root canal in one, and was about to leave for an overseas trip for about a month. She already knew both teeth would need to have crowns, and simply wanted some temporary work to hold her teeth together until she could come back from her trip

Compounding the problem, the patient's teeth had been broken for a few months, and her gum tissue had overgrown into the empty space left by the broken teeth. Before the use of lasers and Cerec in dentistry, the teeth would have received temporary crowns, then the patient would see a periodontist for gum surgery to remove the overgrown gum tissue once she would return from her trip. Six weeks of recovery for her gums would be needed post-surgery until impressions of the teeth could be taken for a lab to make the permanent crowns(usually two weeks are needed for this stage as well). Thus, the patient would be wearing her temporary crowns for 8 weeks + the one month that she would be overseas.

Instead, what we did for her was use our laser to trim back the overgrown tissue. The laser cauterizes the overgrown tissue as it removes it; unlike gum surgery, no sutures are needed with a laser. Also, unlike gum surgery, the laser healing time is almost immediate. Once her tissue was trimmed back to ideal using the laser, we used the Cerec machine to fabricate her permanent crowns in the office. A special camera designed for Cerec use takes three dimensional optical images of the prepared teeth and surrounding areas, and the Cerec software designs the optimal crowns to fit the teeth. This information is transmitted to the Cerec milling machine, which then fabricates the permanent crowns within a few minutes. Consequently, we were able to fabricate both permanent crowns for our patient within two hours. Both crowns were cemented, and our patient left for her overseas trip without having to worry about not chewing on one side of her mouth in order to protect temporaries. Not only was she saved the trouble of going through her trip with temporaries, but most importantly, she did not have to go through gum surgery and an additional 8 weeks of wearing temporaries during her healing period/impression period.

This patient case demonstrates how the latest techniques and equipment have made a dramatic improvement in dental care offered to patients.

B. Djifroudi