Cerec Course – Day 1
June 17, 2010
Pretty interesting. Received a very detailed explanation of the Cerec Connect process – from both the laboratory and operatory perspectives. It seems pretty straightforward, and Sirona, through its “selectively open” approach has taken the necessary steps so a laboratory owner doesn’t feel locked into only using the MC XL milling unit. There are now ways to output to a 3D Systems printer, as well as outputting STL files that can then be loaded into other systems. Of course, there are dongle fees associated with these ancillary services, but nothing insurmountable.
I must say I was a little disappointed to discover that the Cerec models are fabricated using SLA technology. Comparing apples to apples, I personally prefer Cadent’s milled model technology. While I haven’t done any cases using a Cerec model, I have done several cases using the Lava COS models, which are also SLA formed. I don’t think my preference is rooted in anything other than appearance, however I must say that the Cerec yellow models look much nicer than the Lava COS blue models.
Lastly, I was educated to an interesting idea using a palatal index which has been trimmed in such a fashion as to allow the correlation of prepped arch with diagnostic wax-up. After your solid, pre-operative model has been waxed to mimic your desired final contours, make a putty index capturing the palate, in detail. After the putty sets, remove the index and trim the edge of the index closest to the lingual of the teeth so that it resembles the serrated edge of a bread knife. Return the index to the dentist to be luted in place during the capturing of the digital impression images.
Once the digital impression is complete, you can replace the index on to the wax-up model; powder everything, and scan. The jagged edges of the index can then be used to correlate the the impression image and the image of the wax-up. Once correlated, you can make the screen image of the wax-ups translucent creating a “ghosting” that can then be used to design your final restorations.
I may not be doing a good job of explaining this verbally. Will give it a shot once I get home, and take some photos. ”A picture is worth a thousand words”. Ya-da-ya-da-ya-da…
© 2010, Jeff Saylors. All rights reserved.
Looking forward to hearing some new info from this event.
Re the jig mentioned, sorry to dissapoint you but this is still very hit and miss.
The jig has to seat perfectly in the palate to get an accurate correleation and this is where things go amiss. Even a fraction out is enough to cant and screw up the veneers. Of course being able to design multi units at a time would help alot but nooooo.. we still dont have this most basic function with inlab.
Paul – If you’re a regular user of Cerec, I probably don’t have much to offer. We’ve only turned the machine on once in the past year, so its all new to me – kind of like recovering from amnesia.