Dental Info

 Our office is closed from August 19th - Sept 5th. As I have most summers for the last 64 years, I will be spending  time in Woods Hole, Ma. My son and I have rented a house for these two weeks and will enjoy our time swimming, biking and visiting with friends. After a couple of weeks in Woods Hole, We  feel rejuvenated and definitely more fit and happy. I use this time to get myself back in shape by biking every day to Falmouth and back. The Shinning Sea bike path is partly along the water and is beautiful and while NYC has plenty of places to bike, the bike path here is easily accessible from our cottage.  I usually start out my vacation with only enough energy to bike 2/12 miles to Falmouth , where I stop at Coffee Obsession to have an iced coffee before heading home again. As I get in slightly better shape, I extend my trip by several more miles to Sippewissett salt marshes .  While some of my friends don't understand why I don't use my summer vac...

 There are a number of factors that contribute to developing a successful  dental practice. Dentists  need to  develop their clinical skills, leadership ability,  treatment planning ability and also  their salesmanship. In addition successful dental practices need  a sufficient number of active patients who continue to return for treatments year after year . 1. Obviously possessing clinical skills is very important to all dentists. No one wants to go to an incompetent dentist or even one who is just "good enough". Most patients want a highly skilled dentist who will be able to provide them with durable dental restorations that help preserve their dentition. In addition patients desire dentists who provide cosmetic restorations that will keep their smiles looking attractive. 2. Successful dental practices need a hardworking and loyal staff that enhance the delivery of dental care. After all most of a patients interactions are with our staff ....

  Last weekend I booked my reservation for the annual Spear Summit. This event is held yearly in Scottsdale Arizona and Spear brings knowledgeable domestic and international speakers. Whenever I have attended I have enjoyed the trip and the information on dentistry that I obtain. Also the other attendees are either members of the Spear faculty club or other fellow leaders of Spear Study Clubs. I haven't attended one of these since 2019 and am thinking that it may a be a good time to return to an in person Spear Scottsdale meeting. Usually this meeting is held over several days and requires me to close my practice for a day or two.  While I haven't made my mind up for sure, I know I would enjoy this meeting and the opportunities to meet with other like minded dental colleagues. My only two reservations are dealing with airline cancellations and the increasing rate of Covid infections that we have been experiencing. I plan on wearing my mask at the lectures and meals can be...

 My son graduated from NYU College of Dentistry this June. I started teaching at the School shortly before he started 4 years ago. I had always wanted to resume my teaching activitie there ( I had taught briefly in the 1980's) and clearly this was a good time to start teaching again.  I asked if I could be assigned as a clinical instructor of dentistry in NYU's Department of Comprehensive Care and Cariology. As such I would be directly supervising third and fourth year students while they were in the clinics treating patients. I suspected I would be a good instructor and I could give something back both  to my community and to my profession.  I was able to help the students and their patients achieve better dental outcomes and I found that I benefited in other ways as well. I found that the challenges that I faced each week ended up further sharpening my clinical skills and accelerated opportunities for my own learning and definitely improved my clinical dexterity ...

Implant with broken crown part still attached  If your implant crown has a bite that has changed , its time to see your dentist right away. This often can mean that the screw holding in either the abutment or crown is coming loose. This should be addressed since leaving it for a later time can cause the implant screw to break, or even cause the implant to fail if due to due to a failure of the osseointegration that secures the implant to a patients jaw. No matter what the cause is, its best to notify your dentist and ask to come in for a visit as soon as they can schedule an appointment (hopefully with in the week).  broken screw retained implant crown Two weeks ago a patient called me up to let me know that her bite had changed with her implant crown and I saw her promptly. By the time she came in her screw retained crown had fractured and left part of the crown still attached below the gingiva. Fortunately the screw had not broken and I was able to r...

 I find that it is helpful to leave several hours during my working week that are not to be scheduled with patients for me to treat. This allows me to tackle tasks that require thinking or may be time consuming, unpleasant or both.  I can't speak for other dentists, but some of these activities make me anxious or put me in a less than positive mood... Probably it is best not to treat patients when dealing with some issues.  Four years ago, I started teaching part time at NYU College of dentistry on my day off (Friday) and Thursday morning for three hours. Prior to working at NYU, I left open time on Fridays or Thursday mornings for non clerical activities. As much as I enjoy teaching , I don't like having limited time  to for my non clinical hours and was forced to deal with these activities between scheduled patient appointments. Two weeks ago I requested to limit my teaching hours to Fridays and I have resumed my old habit of scheduling time consuming cleric...

 The short answer is there is no one best crown for every situation, but more and more dentists are opting for all ceramic crowns.... either Zirconium or lithium dislicate. They are used in different clincal situations. Please be aware that This post is not intended to be a deep dive into the subject, but may answer may questions about all ceramic crowns So what be the appropriate indications for using the different types of ceramic crowns ( full thickness milled zirconium , Porcelain fused to Zirconium, full thickness lithium disilicate( pressable or milled),  and litium disilicate layered with porcelain. How to make sense of all these choices? Ok , lets try and clarify the different options and which is best in different situations.  Presently, monolithic zirconium crowns are the most commonly made crowns by dentists nationwide. These come in three Primary types; High opacity, medium opacity and high translucency. The opaque version is somewhat stronger and fracture r...