High Technology Dentist
I had to tell you about my new found dentist. Saturday I bit down on a Hershey Bar (from the frig) and broke the side of a tooth that had a Gold crown on it. It managed to leave a really sharp bothersome edge that prevented me from talking well, and it cut my tongue. So.. I was anxious to find a dentist, come Monday to give me some quick fix. This is the second time in 8 months that I have been to the dentist thanks to CANDY. Last time I took one bite of some English carmels and when I opened my mouth, the carmel contained a cap to another tooth (it could have been the same one come to think of it...)
Anyway, my mouth is not really what I wanted to discuss. This Dentist I'm about to discuss has a practice in Hemet, California. Hemet is best known for its many retired folk living in semi-permanent trailer homes. It's not known as the hotbed of medical or dental innovation. (Though it probably has a more than normal density of such professionals due to the demands of older age Americans for staying healthy.)
First clue: I found his web site and he had his email address on it. So.. about 7 PM on Sunday I emailed him with my problem, and surprise.. he returned the email in less than an hour telling me to call him for an Appointment the next Morning. I was shocked. Most medical professionals have a hard time writing the word e-mail, much less knowing how to use it. (One of my pet peeves: a medical profession that eschews the use of computer technology to do any more than posting bills and keeping track of client addresses.)
Anyway, I visited Dr. David May on Monday morning. (His secretary asked when was the soonest I could get there...there is an eight month wait in England for a dentist). He said we would have to build a new cap for the tooth since most of the side was gone. Now, normally you'd have to have an impression of the empty hole in the tooth sent to a lab and wait two weeks. He has a 3D CAD system in the office that takes a picture of the tooth (actually two images, one of the tooth with the crown intact, and one after the crown was taken out), and it creates a 3D image of the area on the computer screen (he's doing this next to me in the dentist chair where I can see it.) He sits there and uses the system to build a tooth on the screen, turns it around for different views, and generally guides the program to a 3D model of a new "tooth hopeful".
Once he is satisfied that the tooth is right and the clearances between the teeth are OK, he uses an in-office wireless ethernet to control a milling machine in the next room to create the enamel looking cap. Once the 3D image is constructed it takes 18 minutes. So, within less than 1.5 hours I was out of there with a new tooth crown in my mouth. And.. since it replaced the Gold one, it looks like a normal tooth.
In addition, he uses digital x-ray photography to have instant x-rays and it reduces the x-ray dosage by a power of ten! I asked him if I could have a copy of the x-ray and he asked if I had a portable USB drive (I didn't), so he said he would email it to me.
So.. maybe this isn't that interesting to you, but I'm impressed that this guy would spend almost $100,000 on such a machine for his private practise so that he could have more control over the end result and happier clients.
One other thing. This dentist was willing to spend enough time with me to make me feel important, or at least that I wasn't in a MacDonald's fast-food line. So many dentists are too busy to talk to their patients. He answered all my questions and took the time to show me how everything was done.
If you need a good dentist in Southern California, Dr. David May in Hemet, California is a good bet.
Anyway, my mouth is not really what I wanted to discuss. This Dentist I'm about to discuss has a practice in Hemet, California. Hemet is best known for its many retired folk living in semi-permanent trailer homes. It's not known as the hotbed of medical or dental innovation. (Though it probably has a more than normal density of such professionals due to the demands of older age Americans for staying healthy.)
First clue: I found his web site and he had his email address on it. So.. about 7 PM on Sunday I emailed him with my problem, and surprise.. he returned the email in less than an hour telling me to call him for an Appointment the next Morning. I was shocked. Most medical professionals have a hard time writing the word e-mail, much less knowing how to use it. (One of my pet peeves: a medical profession that eschews the use of computer technology to do any more than posting bills and keeping track of client addresses.)
Anyway, I visited Dr. David May on Monday morning. (His secretary asked when was the soonest I could get there...there is an eight month wait in England for a dentist). He said we would have to build a new cap for the tooth since most of the side was gone. Now, normally you'd have to have an impression of the empty hole in the tooth sent to a lab and wait two weeks. He has a 3D CAD system in the office that takes a picture of the tooth (actually two images, one of the tooth with the crown intact, and one after the crown was taken out), and it creates a 3D image of the area on the computer screen (he's doing this next to me in the dentist chair where I can see it.) He sits there and uses the system to build a tooth on the screen, turns it around for different views, and generally guides the program to a 3D model of a new "tooth hopeful".
Once he is satisfied that the tooth is right and the clearances between the teeth are OK, he uses an in-office wireless ethernet to control a milling machine in the next room to create the enamel looking cap. Once the 3D image is constructed it takes 18 minutes. So, within less than 1.5 hours I was out of there with a new tooth crown in my mouth. And.. since it replaced the Gold one, it looks like a normal tooth.
In addition, he uses digital x-ray photography to have instant x-rays and it reduces the x-ray dosage by a power of ten! I asked him if I could have a copy of the x-ray and he asked if I had a portable USB drive (I didn't), so he said he would email it to me.
So.. maybe this isn't that interesting to you, but I'm impressed that this guy would spend almost $100,000 on such a machine for his private practise so that he could have more control over the end result and happier clients.
One other thing. This dentist was willing to spend enough time with me to make me feel important, or at least that I wasn't in a MacDonald's fast-food line. So many dentists are too busy to talk to their patients. He answered all my questions and took the time to show me how everything was done.
If you need a good dentist in Southern California, Dr. David May in Hemet, California is a good bet.
posted by RVGuys, Newt Perdue at 5:15 PM
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