Dental Info

  First an update on our practice's new schedule for 2026 . David is seeing patients at our office on Thursdays and some Wednesdays. My schedule is Monday, Tuesday, and Thursdays as well. Friday I am an attending our Mount Sinai's general dental practice Residency. As the new year approaches and the office is closed until January 5th, I have had time to reflect on how things are going in our practice and I am looking forward to the new year and starting my 46 sixth year in dentistry. Its been a long and fascinating journey! When I started, some dentists were still taking copper band impressions for crowns, but most dentists had adopted elastomeric impression materials to accurately capture the details of their preparations. I had been trained in both techniques, but clearly taking elastomeric impressions was easier and allowed fewer steps in crown fabrication.  Now dentists coming out of school are trained in elastomeric and digital impressions. Now my son works in anoth...

 This is a situation that I encounter when I work as an attending at Mount Sinai hospital. Patients show up for emergency treatment at our dental facility. Often they have had the problem for a long time and wait until the tooth is bothering them. Many of the patient pool is dependent on their dental insurance or a possibly a sliding fee scale that they can apply for. If a patients mouth is not missing a high number of teeth, fixing the tooth is a viable option for some patients if they can afford the procedures needed... These can include multiple procedures such as root canal, post and core , crown and possibly crown lengthening. These are all feasible for many teeth, but can be time consuming and expensive. A number of the patients seen at our program opt to extract these teeth rather than to save them.  If multiple teeth are badly decayed with compromised tooth structure extraction often is the preferred option for our patients and replacement of the teeth with removable...

  Although the usual alternative options are a removable denture (partial or full) or a fixed bridge attached to natural dentition, these are not always desired or even possible. My oral surgeon and periodontist can sometimes perform grafting procedures that can miraculously add bone to make implant placement possible even for some extremely deficient ridges. Today my oral surgeon placed three guided implants for one of my patients who had extensive grafting about 4 months ago. He sent me photos of the procedure, and I was extremely impressed. This was the result of diligence for all concerned... My patient helped by not wearing a denture during the last 4 months, even though she had an important family event to go to. Our office helped by sending intraoral scans of the patients preexisting bridge and also fabricating an Essex retainer that could be placed in my patients mouth in order to aid him with his planning and execution.  My surgeons often play the biggest part in...