Dental manufacturer Miele is showcasing its line of sterilizers and instrument cleaners at the IDS this week in Cologne, Germany.

Alongside thermal disinfectors and small sterilizers, air purifiers, washing machines and dishwashers provide protection against viruses and bacteria, and these infection control products are on display at the Miele booth in Cologne from September 22-25.

With their new accessories, Miele thermal disinfectors can be put to universal use, even in the fields of orthodontics and implantology. For the machine-based cleaning and disinfection of multi-function syringes, the company offers matching adapters which guarantee the secure positioning of cannula from a variety of brands in upper and lower baskets.

Additionally, a new insert has been developed which considerably increases the capacity for trays and cartridges–an aspect which simplifies the reprocessing of surgical instruments. All holders can, if required, be inclined to now take 12 trays in the lower basket–twice as many as previously.

If phobic patients have to be treated with laughing gas, the reprocessing of double hoses and masks represents an additional challenge. Early next year Miele will be offering a space-saving solution: A new holder which can hold up to 2 hoses with a capacity that can even be increased to 5. A matching mesh tray is available for reprocessable patients' masks.

Two years after their market launch, the 4 small Miele Cube and Cube X sterilizers offer even greater user convenience by simplifying the reprocessing of instruments in dental practices: these include a new and flexible holder which for the first time accommodates containers and cartridges with a maximum height of 70 mm. Practices which combine the use of a Cube or Cube X unit with a Miele thermal disinfector and hence require considerably more demineralized water now see their needs met fast in the form of Miele full demineralization cartridges.

The company has also developed an app by the name of DataDiary for the wireless transmission of reprocessing data from up to 9 sterilizers. The most recent updated version is available for Android and iOS.

Everywhere in dental practices, Miele machines can reduce the risk of contracting an infection by preventing the spread of viruses and bacteria. Wherever frequent and thorough ventilation is not sufficient, the 3 mobile Miele AirControl air purifiers provide effective assistance: With an air throughput capacity of up to 3,000 cubic meters of air per hour, they are able to replace the entire air in a room 6 times an hour, while at the same time filtering the air as it passes, according to the manufacturer.

A five-stage filtration system which includes a high-performance HEPA H14 particulate filter, captures even the minutest of particles and renders more than 99.995% of all air-borne particles, viruses, bacteria and fungal spores innocuous.

With the company’s System4Dent, a Miele Professional can offer an innovative complete system for the safe and efficient instrument reprocessing in dentists' practices. Based on many years of experience and in close consultation with experts in the field, System4Dent offers a system solution which can be divided into key steps such as cleaning, disinfection, sterilizing, chemical processing, and the highest service quality.

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Miele Cube and Cube X small sterilizers on display at company’s booth in Cologne, along with System4Dent portfolio.

Miele Showcases Infection Control Product Line at IDS

In what sounds like an ideal partnership, Carbon and Keystone Industries announced that the 2 companies have agreed to develop a flexible removable partial denture resin based on Carbon's patented dual cure materials.

The joint effort will bring about the first use of Carbon's patented dual cure process in a dental application. Carbon is a leading 3D printing technology company, while Keystone Industries, is a leading dental and 3D resin products company.

Providing dental professionals with an innovative process to address the large partially edentulous patient population via the ability to print a flexible partial denture will be the next step in the strategic partnership between the 2 companies that was initiated in 2019. The 2 companies originally partnered to launch KeySplint Soft Clear to Carbon’s 3D printing technology platform, and more recent additions of both KeySplint Hard and KeyGuide. This latest development will allow for the first dental use of Carbon’s patented dual cure process.

"Our dual cure resins meet the needs of a broad range of applications. However, this partnership will result in the first use of Carbon's patented dual cure process in a dental application,” Phil DeSimone, cofounder and Chief Product & Business Development Officer, says. “We're excited to extend our partnership with Keystone to expand denture options for doctors and patients."

Related reading: PostProcess Resin Removal Solution Now Compatible with Carbon DPR 10

This partnership builds on Carbon's industry leadership in developing digital denture solutions that are enabling a new standard of care for edentulous patients. In 2019, Carbon partnered with Dentca to introduce the first FDA-approved 3D printed denture. Carbon was also the first 3D printing technology company to partner with Dentsply Sirona to introduce Lucitone Digital Print, the first high-impact, high esthetic denture base. Nearly a quarter-million denture parts have been printed on the Carbon platform through partnerships with Dentsply Sirona and Dentca.

Keystone Industries has spent decades producing leading denture products and, more recently, ground-breaking 3D printing resins for dental professionals. Keystone’s denture expertise spans a wide array of applications: Diamond D® high-impact denture base acrylic (heat and self cure), KeyMill® high-impact CAD/CAM milling discs for denture bases, ClearMet clear, flexible partial denture resin, Millenium PMMA acrylics, the upcoming high-impact pourable version of Diamond D and in 2022, the KeyDenture 3D printing resins. Using this expansive denture material experience to partner with Carbon’s dual cure 3D process will allow the 2 companies to work towards an innovative breakthrough for partial denture frames.

“We have had a long and productive relationship with Carbon,” notes Keystone Industries dental president Ira Rosenau. “Together, we can leverage several strengths of our companies to bring a very substantial innovation to dental professionals – an efficient way to manufacture custom flexible partial dentures for the many patients who need such a prosthetic device to improve their daily lives."

Companies announce plans that will lead to the first use of Carbon's patented dual cure process in a dental application.

Carbon, Keystone Industries Working Together to Develop a Flexible Removable Partial Denture Resin

Plenty of things have been happening this week at Denstply Sirona World 2021, including great live entertainment, innovative product launches and strategic partnership announcements that look to make the global dental manufacturing power even bigger and better going forward. But none of that news is as heartwarming and as potentially impactful as the announcement that the company is launching a 5-year partnership with Smile Train to support safe and quality cleft care for children around the world.

Globally, 1 in 700 babies are born with a cleft lip and/or palate. Clefts can have devastating effects on the quality of life of a child, both physically by compromising the ability to communicate and to eat properly and from social stigma resulting in feelings of anxiety and a lack of self-confidence. A child with a cleft requires more than just surgery. Essential cleft care includes nutrition programs, dental and orthodontic care, speech therapy, and social and emotional support.

Smile Train’s sustainable model empowers local medical professionals to provide free cleft surgery and essential cleft care in their own communities. That’s why Dentsply Sirona is launching this partnership with Smile Train to improve oral health globally and to build a brighter, more sustainable future for children and families affected by cleft worldwide.

The company is going beyond traditional financial and equipment donations. The Dentsply Sirona and Smile Train partnership will advance the future of cleft care by:

Supporting global treatment standards and best practices for digitized cleft care

Leveraging digital technologies to make treatments more efficient and convenient for children

Providing high quality equipment to develop state-of-the-art centers for cleft treatment

Making our entire online catalog of clinical education courses available to all Smile Train oral health professionals

Offering financial support for cleft surgeries.

The company is focused on making sure the benefits of its Smile Train partnership have a lasting impact. Therefore, in addition to funding life-changing cleft surgeries and providing free dental equipment, the collaboration focuses on global, oral healthcare training initiatives to equip people in local communities with the skills needed to provide treatment and raise the standard of care to the highest level through Clinical Education and the use of cutting-edge technologies in the long term.

Additionally, the partnership includes the development of an International Smile Train Scholars program, which will support in-person and virtual training and learning opportunities for Smile Train dental partners. A group of 16 scholars are attending DS World 2021, participating in clinical education sessions and growing their professional networks.

“Our partnership with Smile Train will help children around the world gain access to cleft treatment and offer them the chance to live a happy and healthy life. By also focusing on global treatment standards and best practices, donating innovative technology, and supporting the training and development of local healthcare professionals, the partnership will have an empowering impact on communities and will provide access to the best possible cleft care, for years to come,” says Jorge Gomez, CFO and head of Dentsply Sirona’s Sustainability program “Beyond”. “Smile Train’s focus on comprehensive cleft care and community empowerment is inspiring. We are incredibly proud to partner with them to support their life-changing work.”

“We are pleased to welcome Dentsply Sirona on board as a corporate partner. This 5-year partnership comes at a pivotal moment for Smile Train and will help advance the future of cleft care by supporting global treatment standards and best practices for digitalized cleft orthodontics,” adds Susannah Schaefer, President & Chief Executive Officer, Smile Train. “We are grateful for Dentsply Sirona’s generous support and look forward to working together to raise awareness about and deepen our impact around cleft.”

Dental company announces donation, the official launch of its 5-year partnership with Smile Train, the world’s largest cleft-focused organization.

Dentsply Sirona, Smile Train Partnering Up to Support Cleft Care for Children

Dentsply Sirona continues to extend the Lucitone Digital Print Denture System with new material indications and planned print platform validations for Asiga and SprintRay, it was announced Thursday while the company is holding DS World 2021 in Las Vegas.

The company announced 4 expansions of the Lucitone Digital Print Denture System, adding momentum to the digital transformation of the dental laboratory industry. Three of these expansions are for the digital production of custom tooth arches and segments, including the addition of Lucitone Digital Value 3D Economy Tooth and Trial Placement resin; DS Multilayer PMMA Discs for milling premium denture teeth; and the planned 2022 release of Lucitone Digital IPN, a printed premium denture tooth material.

Later this year, planned printer validations for the Lucitone Digital Print Denture System will include Asiga Max UV and PRO 4K and SprintRay Pro 95 and Pro 55 series printers. Lucitone Digital Value and DS Multilayer PMMA denture tooth workflows are validated and immediately available for Carbon M-Series printers.

These important updates provide dental laboratories greater flexibility to fully digitize their denture production with the superior strength Lucitone Digital Print Denture System. The forthcoming validation of Asiga and SprintRay printers will enable more labs to benefit from the enhanced capacity, throughput and simplicity of Dentsply Sirona printed dentures, delivering repeatable and precise results.

“This collaboration with Dentsply Sirona continues Asiga’s open-system vision to bring best-in-class, highly accurate, highly affordable printing technology to the dental industry,” says Justin Elsey, founder and managing director of Asiga. “Together, we are opening access to dental labs and their patients to a superior combination of printed denture materials and printer accuracy and consistency.”

The MAX series from Asiga features repeatable and precise desktop 3D printers, while the company’s PRO 4K is a larege format floor-standing 3D printer.

“At SprintRay, we strive to build products that work together to create opportunity for collaboration, innovation and, most importantly, outstanding clinical results,” says Amir Mansouri, CEO and Co-Founder. “Our cooperation with Dentsply Sirona embodies this vision by bringing together high-quality products to deliver first-class service to patients all the while empowering improved efficiency and production for dental practices and labs everywhere.”

“Until the introduction of the Lucitone Digital Print Denture System, printed dentures were not a viable option for dental labs,” shares Julie Mroziak, Vice President, Dentsply Sirona Digital Lab and Preventive Solutions. “Now, with the planned validation of Asiga and SprintRay printers for Lucitone Digital Print Denture, and more material options, labs can begin transitioning from analog denture procedures to the more efficient, digitally printed denture workflows. The digital acceleration of the removable lab industry is truly exciting, and a win-win for the lab, dentist and patient experience.”

With the versatile Dentsply Sirona Multilayer PMMA 98mm disc range, dental labs now can mill custom tooth arches or segments to digitally manage more challenging removable cases, including reduced vertical and Class II and Class III occlusions. The disc product line provides comprehensive shade choices, 17 in total, three-disc thicknesses, and delivers premium tooth esthetics.

Additionally, the dual-use Lucitone Digital Value 3D Economy Tooth & Trial Placement resin allows for printing try-in appliances and economy tooth arches and segments. This ready-to-print tooth material balances economic durability and esthetics. The material is available in 6 shades and suitable for all clinical classifications of full-arch denture cases.

The planned 2022 release of Lucitone Digital IPN will be Dentsply Sirona’s first printed premium denture tooth solution. This new material is expected to have exceptional wear characteristics and include 16 shades plus bleach options. The Lucitone Digital IPN material is designed to remove all barriers for dental laboratories’ migration to digital denture workflows.

The clinical and laboratory workflows are simple and easy for rapid integration. With these anticipated printer validations and material launches, laboratories of all sizes can better meet increasing volume demands, achieve greater profitability, and provide patients with an experience and denture that will make them smile in partnership with their dentist.

New denture tooth materials and indications significantly expand Dentsply Sirona’s production capabilities of the Lucitone Digital Print Denture System enabling the production of nearly all full arch denture types. 

New Material Indications, Planned Print Platform Validations Key to Lucitone Digital Print Denture System Extension 

Some commercially available products consumers have been using to fight gum disease are outdated and ineffective. Evidence of this comes from the fact that nearly half of Americans over 30 have some form of gum disease, and there has not been enough innovation in products that are designed to fight it – until now, according to the manufacturer bäz.

Jean-Jacques Elbaz, DDS, a Beverly Hills-based periodontist and expert on the Dental Board of California, developed a game-changing product: the Gumline Cleaner. By tracing the gum line, users can manually remove sticky plaque that builds in these areas by using friction.

Additionally, the soft tip massages gum tissue – promoting blood flow – and the bristles provide abrasion for effective biofilm removal. Not an interdental pick, the Gumline Cleaner focuses on the gingival margin. Its ergonomic handle allows the user to clean distal and hard-to-reach areas that toothbrushes can’t reach.

The new product is especially effective for patients who have traditional braces or aligner trays, recessions, dental implants, crowns & bridges, crowding, gingival inflammation, and more. Patients can find it online or at select dental practices. There are hundreds of toothbrushes, dozens of flossing and interdental products, lots of mouth rinses, but now there’s Gumline Cleaner, designed to provide better protection against plaque buildup around the gum line than what is achieved by brushing and rinsing with traditional products.

Ergonomic handle allows the user to clean distal and hard-to-reach areas that toothbrushes can’t reach.

New Gumline Cleaner From  bäz Designed to Focus on Gingival Margin

Quicker turnaround times are just 1 of the many features included with the fully automatic Ceramill Map 600+, Amann Girrbach's new scanner flagship for open articulator scanning that was announced on Thursday. The scanner is designed to deliver outstanding precision for perfect restorations and optimally support dental technicians in their work.

This new high-performance scanner heralds the advent of Industry 4.0 in the laboratory. The intelligent software algorithm automatically assigns the upper and lower jaws, thereby eliminating the vestibular scan and thus up to 30 percent of the manual steps in the laboratory. Due to its integrated universal carrier plate for all common types of articulators, the Map 600+ saves time-consuming plate changes and the intelligent scan height control automatically moves the object to be scanned into the best possible scanning area.

Amann Girrbach has equipped the Map 600+ with an Ultra HD camera. The highly sensitive industrial 3D sensor with Blue Light technology is designed to ensure outstanding depth of field and a scanning accuracy of 4 micrometers. Making optimal use of the advantages of digitization and a seamless workflow requires the model situation from the real articulator to be converted into a data set with maximum precision.

The scanner’s new, more efficient calculation algorithm also reduces the matching time by up to 35 percent, depending on the indication. This reduces the active waiting time of a scanning process by up to 25 seconds. Depending on the indication, the Ceramill Map 600+ therefore provides time savings of between 15 and 38 percent, according to Amann Girrbach.

Amann Girrbach's new scanner for open articulator scanning also produces even shorter turnaround times. 

Ceramill Map 600+ Delivers High-Speed Scanning with Maximum Precision

Vivos Therapeutics, Inc, has announced today the official formation of the Vivos Medical Consortium, a physician working group that will work to advance the company’s obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) technology capabilities.

This physician working group will collaborate to advance the technology’s capabilities and includes renowned physicians with specialties in sleep medicine, neurology, pediatrics, pulmonology, anesthesiology, pain medicine, otolaryngology, obstetrics and gynecology, cardiology, and forensic pathology from prominent academic institutions in the U.S. and Canada.

Led by Drs. Clete Kushida of Stanford University and Cecilia Wu of the University of Alberta, the Vivos Medical Consortium will assist the company with the planning, dissemination and conduct of key research initiatives, enhancing physician-dental collaborations, and expanding novel applications of the Vivos technology for additional medical conditions.

Members of the Vivos Medical Consortium include:

• Clete Kushida MD PhD (Co-Chair), Division Chief and Medical Director of Sleep Medicine; Neurologist, Professor, and Associate Chair, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University

• Cecilia Wu MD (Co-Chair), Anatomic, Cardiovascular and Forensic Pathology; Assistant Clinical Professor, University of Alberta

• Fred Lin MD, Division Chief of Sleep Surgery; Assistant Professor; Department of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

• Manisha Witmans MD, Sleep Medicine Specialist and Pediatric Pulmonology; Associate Clinical Professor, University of Alberta

• Samuel DeMaria MD, Professor of Anesthesiology, Perioperative & Pain Medicine and of Otolaryngology; Vice Chairman for Research, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

• Seth Heckman MD, Obstetrics and Gynecology; Assistant Clinical Professor of Family Medicine, University of Alberta

• Yury Khelemsky MD, Program Director, Pain Medicine Fellowship; Associate Professor, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine; Department of Neurology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

“Every specialty in medicine deals with the negative impact of obstructive sleep apnea in some way, with the end stage of untreated sleep apnea including diminished quality of life, cardiac and metabolic disease, and the potential for premature death,” said Dr Wu. “Now more than ever, we are seeing the critical importance of optimizing personal health. For decades, the only treatment options for sleep apnea were limited and often invasive, but with the Vivos technology, that has changed dramatically.

“Our working group of physicians has been impressed by the potential impact of the Vivos technology and its applications, and I am excited to co-lead the Vivos Medical Consortium with Dr Kushida as we help guide the company’s scientific progress and research endeavors, as well as raise further awareness of the Vivos technology within the medical arena.”

Commenting on the anticipated impact of the Vivos Medical Consortium, Vivos Chairman and CEO Kirk Huntsman states, “Obstructive sleep apnea is a serious medical problem, yet it is one that, through the use of the Vivos technology, now has a highly effective medical solution that can be delivered by a dentist. With the guidance of the Vivos Medical Consortium, we look forward continuing to advance our technology and presence in the medical and dental communities and fulfilling our mission statement of combating this devastating disease by treating the underlying cause of OSA with minimal impact on quality of life. We are hopeful that our Medical Consortium will facilitate wider adoption of our technology for patients who would benefit from our non-surgical, non-invasive solution.”

Members of the Medical Consortium will serve as consultants to Vivos and receive customary cash and equity compensation, states the medical technology company focused on developing and commercializing innovative treatments for patients suffering from mild-to-moderate obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and snoring.

Team of prominent, multi-disciplinary medical doctors guiding research and fostering increased physician-dental collaboration in the management of obstructive-sleep apnea.


New Medical Consortium Formed to Advance Vivos Therapeutics’ Technology for OSA

Three signature workflows to provide dental professionals with a completely new way of practicing implantology and solutions from scan to crown that outperform expectations in efficiency, accuracy, esthetics, longevity and simplicity were introduced today by Dentsply Sirona. Additionally, the company has launched DS PrimeTaper, a self-tapping implant.

The dental manufacturer just announced the comprehensive restage of its implants business, including:

The Single Tooth Signature Workflow enables customers to do more and better, faster, simpler, freeing up time to see more patients.

The Partial Multiple Tooth Replacement Signature Workflow solves a signature patient case with three posterior teeth missing to be restored with a 3-unit bridge on 2 implants for more confidence for the clinician and more comfort for the patient.

The Full Arch Signature Workflow addresses a signature patient case with an edentulous maxilla. The workflow offers a restoration with a fix bridge on 4 implants with immediate temporization.

With a complete ecoystem of digital solutions and products – including well-known brands like Simplant, OSSIX, Axeos, Primescan, Atlantis and MIS – Dentsply Sirona is streamlining implant treatments for practice growth and consistent patient satisfaction.

Dentsply Sirona Implants is now presenting DS PrimeTaper, a self-tapping implant with a tapered design that can be inserted safely and easily. This enables long-term bone stability. The double thread allows the implant to be inserted quickly and safely. A simple drilling protocol, with only a few different drills, supports the workflow.

The company worked closely with the global implant key opinion leader community, and they have already started gaining experience with the product. Their reactions have been very positive:

Dan Butterman, DDS, from Centennial, Colorado, emphasizes the importance of a seamless workflow. “DS PrimeTaper represents the next step in implant dentistry. The digital-driven workflow results in higher accuracy, repeatability of processes, and time savings,” Butterman says. "My patients have better things to do than spending time in my office. Thanks to clearly defined processes and digital solutions, I can offer safer and faster treatment options which my patients appreciate. That's what efficiency is all about."

• Martin Wanendeya, DDS, from the United Kingdom, notes "DS PrimeTaper as a part of an integrated concept is different from what we knew before. In addition to reducing chair time and simplifying collaboration with my laboratory, Primescan for Atlantis suprastructures ensures esthetic predictability and a perfect fit.”

Seamless Concept for Transforming Digital Implant Dentistry


“Dentsply Sirona is about intelligent concepts that work intuitively and improve the predictability of treatment,” says Terri Dolan, DDS, Chief Clinical Officer at Dentsply Sirona. “Our goal is to enable clinicians, including both specialists and general practitioners, to focus on what they do best – creating healthy and beautiful smiles. We are confident that we are building a winning future in the area of implant solutions focused on the needs of our implant customers and their patients. Our connected and seamless concept for transforming digital implant dentistry is a first, essential step in this direction. Our vision for digital implant dentistry will be supported by a global clinical education program focused on end-to-end digital implant workflow solutions to achieve clinic, technical and practice excellence. The extensive curriculum is designed to build clinicians’ digital implant skills according to their level of experience and personal learning preferences.”


Dentsply World 2021 is taking place this week in Las Vegas, Nevada.

In cooperation with the McGuire Institute (iMc), 2 levels of evidence will be covered: The basis is provided by a prospective, multicenter, clinical study evaluating the complete digital workflow including 10 private practice investigators and their referrals for a five-year follow-up.

In addition, an ambitious registry study has been initiated aiming to involve more than 500 clinicians, placing over 2500 implants for long-term follow-up. A key benefit of a registry study is to obtain long-term clinical data without being prescriptive or having a specific endpoint. Therefore, it’s a powerful tool to create scientific evidence and market insights from the daily use of the product by the clinician. Both the clinical trial and the registry will collect “Real World Evidence” which is now recognized by the FDA as being the standard in collecting data and is meaningful to clinicians and patients alike.

Company is launching DS Implants, harmonizing successful brands like Simplant, OSSIX, Atlantis and MIS. 

Dentsply Sirona Launches DS PrimeTaper, Announces Comprehensive Restage of its Implant Business

Sterngold’s original ERA® overdenture partial denture attachment system has been the choice of many dentists since its development in 1991—remains the standard in the industry today—and now the company has released the ERA RV Male Attachment, new green and purple extra oversized males, new options for long-time ERA patients.

Before the introduction of the ERA concept, patients and dental professionals alike were frequently frustrated by high costs from other options, complexity (other options could be difficult to fabricate, implement or maintain) and most important, resiliency. In the past, some options have been unreliable for long-term patient use.

ERA attachments consist of a metal female component, which is intraorally fixed, and a replaceable, high density nylon male anchored in the denture base. Smaller and more resilient, the ERA attachments are designed to deliver much greater overall performance.

Directing more force away from the implants or attachment side, the ERA allows the prosthesis to remain tissue supported, generating less wear to both the attachment as well as the insert. This means greater comfort, stability, and ease of use for the patient, according to Sterngold.

As clinical studies have proven the longevity and reliability of these attachments over several decades, Sterngold now offers green and purple retentive inserts for the ERA® RV partial denture attachment system.

ERA Male Attachments — Levels of Retention


Every attachment procedure begins with the black processing insert. This insert has a built-in spacer so it sits rigidly on top of the female. When you’re ready to remove and replace the black male insert, you have a multitude of options, each one increasing in retention. For many years, your ERA® male attachment insert options were limited to the following:

Now Sterngold is offering even greater retention with these 2 additional ERA male attachment options:

There are 4 types of ERA males: partial denture — ERA RV, Micro ERA, ERA Overdenture, and Micro ERA Overdenture. In any case, all ERA males are mechanically anchored in the denture base, providing both vertical resiliency as well as universal hinge movement.

To implement an ERA RV attachment, you can purchase all the materials you’ll need in the company’s Stern ERA RV Starter Kit. This kit includes:

Additionally, the process of removing and replacing ERA males is simple. Worn out males can be removed with a specially designed bur and the new ones simply snap into a metal jacket that’s been permanently processed into the denture. Simply follow these steps:

Use the core cutter trephine bur to remove the center post of the male.

Pop the remnant of the male out with the ERA® extraction tool.

Snap the new male into the metal jacket or denture acrylic.

Resiliency, dependability, and budget-friendly, the ERA attachment system is a dependable choice for removable partial denture and overdenture treatments. The addition of new retention inserts only expands the number of patients who can now be considered for this proven treatment method.

The addition of new retention inserts only expands the number of patients who can now be considered for this proven treatment method.

Sterngold Introduces the ERA RV Green & Purple Retentive Inserts for Partial Dentures

Dentsply Sirona is partnering on a series of initiatives designed to move the dental industry forward towards a more sustainable future, and today announced its updated sustainability strategy, the release of its inaugural sustainability report, and new sustainability hub on its website.

Dentsply Sirona’s disclosure is aligned with the guidelines from the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) and the Task Force for Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD).

“Sustainability is fundamental to our mission and vision. We strive to create long term value for all our stakeholders by supporting our customers to provide world-class dental care, while integrating sustainability and lifecycle thinking into everything we do,” says Jorge M. Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, Dentsply Sirona and chair of the Dentsply Sirona Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Committee. The company’s Dentsply Sirona World 2021 is taking place this week in Las Vegas.

Aligned with 10 UN Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs), the company’s sustainability strategy focuses on 3 strategic pillars: “Healthy Planet”, which strives to mitigate the environmental impact of our operations; “Healthy Smiles”, which focuses on improving oral health quality and access globally, supporting our customers and fostering a healthy company culture; and, “Healthy Business”, which ensures our business is built via responsible and transparent practices and the effective integration of sustainability principles across all aspects of our business.

2020 sustainability highlights and the next milestones:

Established a robust baseline for Scopes 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and implemented a range of on-site emissions reduction initiatives

Set out to reduce Scopes 1 and 2 GHG Emissions Reduction ≥ 15% by 2025, and to achieve net zero carbon emissions (scopes 1-3) by 2050

6% YOY decrease in total waste (solid and hazardous) per measure of net sales, and set out to reduce total waste ≥15% by 2025

Established a goal to reduce water withdrawal for manufacturing/warehouse operations by ≥15% by 2025.

Trained more than 1 million dental professionals in 2020

Nearly 7,300 Clinical Education and training courses conducted in 80 countries

Set goal to achieve 25 million smiles by 2025

Working to achieve gender parity and gender pay parity by 2025

More than $10 million provided in cash and in-kind donations to philanthropic and community initiatives

50% of Board members are gender and/or ethnically diverse, with average tenure of 5 years

91% of Board is independent (all except Chief Executive Officer)

Dentsply Sirona is partnering on a series of initiatives designed to move the dental industry forward towards a more sustainable future. It is a Founding Partner in the FDI World Dental Federation’s “Sustainability in Dentistry” initiative, joining GSK, Procter & Gamble, Colgate and TePe to create a Code of Good Practice, which will provide guidelines and objectives for achieving a sustainable procurement and supply process throughout the dental industry.

“The world is facing major environmental, social and economic challenges, and all sectors need to step up and play their part,” says Don Casey, Chief Executive Officer, Dentsply Sirona. “As a global leader in dentistry, Dentsply Sirona has a responsibility to go above and beyond to create a more sustainable future – empowering not only our employees, but our customers, partners and peers to take action with us.”

Company committed to drive change towards sustainable dentistry, announces sustainability goals, and publishes its inaugural sustainability report and new dedicated hub on its website.

Beyond. Taking Action for a Brighter World is Dentsply Sirona’s New Sustainability Strategy

30 Minutes of Therapy - Episode 18 - Becoming Better at Delegating Tasks


Hello, and welcome back to 30 Minutes of Therapy. It's been a while, but we're excited to be back. I'm Noah Levine, editorial director for Dental Products Report, and, as always, we're joined by Mike Massotto, who is the CEO and founder of Staff Driven Dental and Dental Coaching on Demand. And he's here to help us deal with all the different issues, challenges and problems that might arise while running your dental practices. Mike, welcome back to the program. I hope all is good with you.

Yes, I returned for my own therapy. No, ironically, the last well, the last show, people have noticed that before we did the show, I was like, No, I'm not 100%. I'm not feeling too great, but I'll power through. That was on August second, and I had COVID. So, I did a show with COVID. It became that I was I was down for the count for several weeks. And now back at it, but I don't recommend that, by the way, if anybody who's thinking about getting COVID try to avoid it if you can. You know, but thankfully I, you know, I’m feeling strong, I got my immunity, and I said, to all of you out there for doing the best, whatever works for you, and to take care of yourselves. And Noah, I know you were talking about a disaster. Business disasters never happened anywhere else only in dental practices, right? What was it? You were telling me? Right?

Yep. Well, today we have a topic that I'm pretty excited about. Because, you know, dental practices are often run by dentists who don't have a business background, we've discussed that a lot before, but they're also run by a dentist who tend to be people who are very hands on very particular, and therefore probably keep themselves involved in way more parts of the practice than they probably should. So, we're going to touch on the topic of the things that a dentist should not be doing in the practice, and basically, it's not if you're a 1-person show or 2-person show, yeah, you'll do more things. But if you've got a full operation, delegating is really important. Honestly, it's been a lesson I've been learning the hard way through the last year or so where I figured I need to delegate more things. And the more you do it, the better I've found, at least the better I get at it, the more comfortable I am trusting that the team members I've empowered to do tasks I pioneered how to do, they can do it just as well as I can if I teach them correctly. So, to dive in, are there any major top line things, you know, this is something no matter what the dentist should just not be bothering having this on his or her to do list?

I'm going to give you the full list of what dentists should be doing right now. So, if you're listening to this, please write this down. I've compiled a very extensive list of what dentists should be doing in the dental practice with exclusion of all else. And the first one is dentistry. And, okay, I'm being a little facetious, because are a few of the things you should be doing. But that but here's the thing, and this is what I always tell my clients: hey, there's only 1 person that can do it, you know, in the office when you do, and that's you as dentist, okay? No one else can do that job. Right? So, if you're not doing dentistry, right, it's probably to the detriment of the practice, right? If you're sitting around the office, twiddling your thumbs, not seeing patients, right, that's not a good thing. Or if you are hovering around the front desk to make sure they're doing their job properly, that's not a good thing. Because you just have a lot of time on your hands when you should be in your chairs, you know, chairside doing dentistry.

And, that's the big detrimental thing doctors don't understand, you know, that that's the main thing you should be focusing on. You know, that's what you have a team for, right? And that's why you should be, you know, training this team. So, you don't have to do every single aspect of the office because it isn't a challenging thing. You know, doctors get into dentistry, we've talked about this before, and find out after the fact it's a business, right? They find out the hardball crap, I got a business you know, I didn't know how to do all this kind of stuff besides dentistry, whatever and, and, you know, universally, you know, most dentists that I speak to they just like doing dentistry. They love doing work and taking care of patients. What they can't stand is all the crap of practice like well that they got it you know, and it's crap because they really don't have the training and know-how what to do. You know, they're not taught to be leaders and managers and executives and business people, and you know, all these fun things like bookkeepers, accountants, mediators, you know, politicians, diplomats. This is what the guys do on a daily basis on top of everything else, and this is what takes the love away from what they're doing. I think that they don't like it and being analytical and men or women in science, that it's hard for them to comprehend this because you know, they, they're taught so well on their craft, but when they don't know what they're doing when it comes to doing the management part, the business part, it's frustrating. So, they try to make it up as they go along where they feel like you know, if I get involved, but I do everything, you know, I got it covered, you know, we just operate that way, if you have to do everything all the time, it's really an indictment how your practice is running. It really is because you know, what are you paying your staff with? And why do you have your staff there, you feel they can't do the job, and they don't know what you're doing? And you think you can do better than them? You know, which is not, which is not the case, really. Most of the people you hire have a specific skill set, usually better than us, like, for instance, you know, Doc, tell me you could do hygiene, you know, I know you can do it. But mostly you have a hygienist because A.) Anybody can do it better than you and B.) Because it’s not productive when you have to schedule for hygiene, right? So, I know you can do it, right? Can you answer the phones, your front desk? And you can do that? Is it the best way of doing your practice? No, it's not. Right. So, this is the first area right there. So, knowing that dentistry should be your main ultimate focus and get there, you have a day where all you can do is dentistry, and not worry about everything else.

Still many times the dentist is essentially the CEO at the practice. They're the person who is in charge so [they’re] the person often signing the checks. They're the person who makes the final decisions, hirings, firings, what is going to be bought for the practice. Outside the operatory might not be a priority, but how involved--let's start at the front desk operations. You've got your office manager, or your front desk receptionist who handles some scheduling recall type stuff, obviously, checking in patients, checking out patients. Is there anything that a dentist should be doing up in that space at all during the day? Or you know, is that just kind of set it forget it and trust you've hired well?

Yeah, I always--didn't we talk about the invisible dog fence collar, you know, we thought that might come up on your list, you got me the list of prior episodes we talked about. But it's a big No No, to basically go wander into the space especially the front desk [because it] is a nerve center of your practice. And really, a lot of doctors who listen to this need to spend more time starting with that and you build out from there, you might think it's hygiene or assisting or other some other spot in your practice. But man, it starts and ends at the front desk, and that can make or break you every single day. If your front desk is weak, and you feel you have to be up there, because of what they're saying, and how they're saying it and what they're doing, and how what they're doing is not good, because it's in your mind, it's not working. First of all, that's in your head. That's what you need to get out and set expectations and set up training. When you put a person in their job in a job description, first of all, as you train these people on, then you need a certain kind of personality. I've talked about having the right people in the right places doing the right things, you know, that position, you cannot skimp on. A ton of money is made or lost at that front desk every day, and someone being up there. When you put a person on a job and you have to hover over them, it’s very invalidating. That person [will] feel like “Well, why am I even here?”

Like if you were in your room, your operatory doing treatment, a crown prep, let's say and all of the sudden the front desk decided to wander in and stand over you and make commentary and interject themselves into what you were doing, you'd be like, “What the hell are you doing here?” Because I know this better than you why are you here? 

Well, that’s kind of how the front desk person should feel when you're doing the hover management thing. It doesn't really work, and it's also admitting that we don't really have control over the practice. The way to have control is training, and doing proper staffing, and [to] not have to worry and you can sit, you know, you can let go of some of this control, because doctors really have to control every single thing in the sphere of influence every day. That's very stressful. If you're if you're looking into someone's mouth, and all you hear is everything in the background, because your attention is out there behind you with whatever is going on around you, you need to be in that zone treating people. You can't worry about what's going on around you every second of every day. So that that front desk area, it usually is because we don’t, we take that for granted. We don't put enough attention in there in terms of who we're hiring, and who and how they're trained. And what do we have enough people out there too, and whatever that we feel if we ask the doctor to interject ourselves, the part that I don't recommend it is not a way of practice. 

I don't think anybody listening to this would prefer doing that. “No I love my day when I have to continually leave my room and come up to the front desk and worry about what's going on there. We spend time out there.” I don't think they'd rather not; you know, you'd rather be doing what you love to do.

So, this starts with how you go about staffing each position, training for each position, but I wouldn't--I'm not a big believer in that. Yes, you made a point about CEO, Noah. Obviously. I would think that certainly we were joking before about all my passwords change and just scrambling to figure out your passwords to get off today where well that'd be nice to know that before the last meeting and stuff like that, but again, that's where having a CEO, you know, in charge and giving out orders to everybody and make sure they understand; “Hey, I need to know these things and whatever you want.” The doctors also on the production line. It's a strange thing. Like, for instance, when you go to work, you're not the one doing like putting magazines together or doing the content online to make sure it's all laid out properly. If you had to do that, like with Bill Gates, he didn't worry about computer assembly, he was at the top of the organizational board and everything on it. But this industry is strange in that the dentist is not only the CEO, and owner, right? He's the production. So, when we ring the bell and productions part, he goes down in here in the organization, right. He's working inside the operations now. So, who is taking over? Well, that's where the manager moves to that role, where they're basically calling the shots. They're quarterbacking today. So you don't have to worry and do everything else. At least that's optimally how it should be. I'm not saying it's going on right now. And most people listening to this right now, and I'll get to that point. But that's optimally what you want to get into.

Should the doctor be maybe checking things at the beginning of the day, and then the end of the day, whether it's a dashboard they've set up in their software, or some standard reporting that they want to keep track of? Is that a good idea?

Yeah, checks and balances are a good thing. Man. You know, there's no doubt because you hear more and more, I know that the fear doctors have is, if they're not aware of everything, and especially when it comes to money. I don't recommend you get disconnected. And I still don't hear this as you're disconnected from what's going on with your money. Like, where's the insurance going and where that's going, and how much money is being deposit or how much cash is being collected at the front desk, you need to be aware of what's going on with that note, no doubt about that whatsoever. Having a series of checks and balances. That's one reason I always started with a morning huddle. We did a show on that and go back and listen to him, but that's a that's a check thing for the day to make sure that things go the way you want them go, then at the end of the day, you should be getting a look at the day sheet, you should be sitting down and taking it out [so] you can have a checklist looking at what you're looking at right now. Sure, but that that sheet will take hours upon hours to do that. So, there should be monitors, there should be checks and balances that you go over.

And when you really get a powerhouse you can trust and trust is the key factor. Right? You don't trust him immediately. But you build trust over time. You have to let go. At some point you got to trust this person. She's been doing this, she's demonstrated to me and you've done your background check maybe in the beginning and everything else you do you trust this person, you have to allow her to do to do her thing. It can you get screwed over. Yes, anything's possible. We can't live life in no trust. It's not a great life in practice, when you don't trust anybody, you know, when you don't trust your staff into their job, or their trusted or, although they're all after me. If you live in that kind of life, you got the wrong kind of staff, first of all, right? And if you had a great kind of staff, and he's still operating that you listen to the one I sent on my therapy couch because he can't operate like that every day in no trust. Right? You know, and that's the starting point.

Moving back from the front desk, you touched on that the hygiene room is co that's not where the doctor should be spending much time. But is there ever any time again that you know, you need to be involved checking on things in hygiene? Or is that something where you're hiring your own set of medical professionals to do what they've been trained to do? You almost don't need to be in there other than those checks at the end of the appointments.

What are the checks the important thing, right, that the need is that short 2-minute time in the law in the room? And there's a whole way that what I teach that should be but other than that, no, unless you're doing your own hygiene, which again, I'm not recommending, but some people have don't have the means at this point. And they have by necessity or have taken on that role. But ultimately having a strong hygiene department, which is the internal sales, divinity of your dental practice, if you're a general practitioner, is important. And it's not productive to hygiene, your schedule. Yeah, so there's really no reason to be in especially hygiene. I mean, these people have other licensed clinicians, you know, these people are doing this treatment, if you have to be in there for clinical reasons to do something. That's a major problem, major problem, right? There's really no reason I guess, but look, if you're doing sales and hygiene, now, sometimes hygiene is co-diagnose, right and they present, your work is going to be done based on your standard of care. And they have put pictures up on there and you're going to come in, you're going to do a presentation Well, yes, that's the time you're gonna spend a little more time in hygiene on the sales, but that's you, but then you're helping close a case or confirm treatment recommendations there, right? Because they can't make it in a vacuum by themselves legally. So, you have to go in there and do a sales presentation. That's the time to be in there that you're needed to do basically. Yes, it was your blessing. So yep, this is basically what I think, you know, whatever. That's the fun to be in it. But other than that, I guess on a clinical level, there's really no reason for doctors to be involved in it. There's not really any official profit.

Now moving to a practice that's large enough and well-staffed enough that they actually have a treatment coordinator on staff someone who works with patients and you know, usually is dealing with the financial side of setting up bigger treatment plans and things like that, does the doctor need to be involved in that the whole time? Can the doctor kind of present what the clinical thing is and then turn it over to their treatment coordinator to actually nail down scheduling payments and all of those critical but somewhat ancillary details?

You get a whole show on treatment coordinators? That's another. For sure, for sure. But yeah, I mean, some doctors like to get involved in the money aspect of the whole thing. There's, I have a couple of my program. And they're powerhouse sellers. And they love doing they take it from start to finish. And then they close 15 20,000 cases left and right. Right. But for the most part, dentists are not salespeople, I recommend separating it out. Because you don't want to get involved with the money and take on that role as well as your to do the clinician and not the not the salesperson state separate from the need to get divided. But yes, you have to find a strong salesperson who you can hand it off to. Right, and they do their thing. So yeah, I feel the part that doctors involved with is the clinical presentation. And, and a way that you add some control in yours, you know what's going on and make sure it goes right, is Yeah, I always recommend doing this presentation with a treatment coordinator initially in front of them in front of the patient. So that when you're making that for them they're in on the whole process, so there's no treatment coordinator leaves, the room goes in, it goes into her room, touch the door, whatever emerges victorious and 30 minutes, the winner. It shouldn't be that way. It should be sold before they get in there.

But part of it is like at the doctor how many times is the treatment coordinator running back and forth to the doctor asking questions. What did you tell her? What did you say? This should all be understood. When the patient challenges you, as you know, and it will happen, you can go well, you know, when the doctor said, you know, you're gonna have the doctors presenting this to you when we were taught. And they know so they don't have you don't have to get the doctor involved again and get pulled into a room. When is that the I'm a sales pitch on the sales closer. That sale should be almost done when they sit with it just to be working out the money, the finances at that point, they’re not convinced by the time they sit with that treatment coordinator, we missed something earlier in our presentation. Right? That's right. 

So that's why doctors are constantly getting pulled into these rooms, and getting involved in trying to pull these cases, but I don't recommend it. Because I said before, then they're not the best sales guy to separate the money, you know, from what you do clinically. Look and they are mostly ever women, they can do it better than you. They will with the right training, and What other people can say about you is much more powerful thing than you say about yourself. They're your advocate, they don't think that they're presenting with it because they think you got 1 hand in your mouth, 1 hand in your pocket your pocket kind of thing. That's why it's good to have someone else do that. And not you get involved. And I'm not saying you can't I'm not saying that doctors aren't great at it. And you want to take that role if you're the strongest person. But trying to find trade, you've got to find a person who's who's going to be your closer so you don't have to get involved in the sales processes, because that's very time consuming. Because what do you think what's going on in that office all day long, besides treatment—sales. You hate to use that dirty word about sales. Again, it's come up many times in our episodes, yes, people are making buying decisions all the time they're in your office, right? And you don't want to be involving yourself in any buying decisions throughout the course of the day. For sure.

Now, so we've established dentist should be doing dentistry, the practice should have people who are trained and expert in the various other tasks that it takes to run the business of a dental practice. So turning this on its head, what do you do if you're the receptionist, or you're the office manager, and the dentist is constantly over your shoulder or constantly, you know, wandering out from the operatory between patients and in your business a little bit.

Yeah we’ll use the famous line that I had that I saw one office manager use when she was a very strong front desk person she didn't need any intervention and the doctor was notoriously bad at wandering back up to the front desk. She'd see him out of the corner of her eye and say “Back in your hole!” You know that kind of relationship so I wouldn't recommend that script don't say that to whoever, in front of patients especially, but that's the kind of thing is like there's a barrier there that if you have a doctor that's doing that and it's wandering in you know, first of all, you gotta make some agreements of how that's going to get asked to be discussed. If you if you are if you are at the front desk and you have a doctor coming up there is having a similar kind of thought What about me are you uncertain about what do you what are you worried about, you know, that kind of thing and have some conversation with that about that, you know, because if it's continually happening, you address it. You don’t address it in front of patients or anything as to why you here that's not a good thing to say in front of a patient at that point but sitting down and saying if you have if you have a scenario like that, when a doctor feels to wander in there.

And here's a solution for that make that doctor so busy that they have no time to be That's the issue you know you're that part of that's on you front desk person you know manager if you schedule so many holes that he feels he's you know doctors can't stand holes right you got you get so fed up of hearing the doctor about holes you know you put a cabinet schedule you know and then the doctor walks in is wiser Academy chair. It's like yeah, the cat you know needs treatment work on the cat so you know, I don't work with man, you know, I don't mind recommend working on cats can't have hairballs, the guy goes, don't put cats in the chair. Okay, but that's almost like it because you want to be smart, busy, not stupid, because you don't put anybody whatever. But you want to fill the schedule, though, because doctors can stand holes. And that's when hovering starts happening hold squads hovering, you know, involvement, there is the worst thing you can have an idle doctor, because I don't want this basically, if you think they want to be busy, right? They want to be doing something with their hands. Right? And then they start getting involved in things that they shouldn't be getting involved in to the detriment of the practice, you know, so that's the solution is this keep the doctor schedule full and busy. Right? Then, you know, she's got no time. Now, time management. Another thing that always wasn't most infuriating is when a doctor does have a full schedule, you know, of all and they still are not they're not in the rooms, they're someplace else. Okay, well, that's a control thing now. All right. And that's a major problem that you see that doctors feel they have no concept of time, you know, time man. So they just like wait, and you have a full, what are you doing here or there or in your office or whatever you need to be in the room, you know, to keep on time, so part of the job of the front desk person that is met with a manager is to keep the doctor running on time, you know, moving from room to room to room, they had no time to think about it, he or she's got no time to think about anything else other than treatment, right. And then insurers have no time to be involved in anybody else's business, except their own, you might try.

It sounds to me, like this is an area that comes down to some of the core things we've talked about in previous episodes, that if you have a good team in place, you're going to be able to run a practice very efficiently and very effectively. But if you have people who aren't able to do their jobs, then other people get pulled out of position. And essentially, you know, it's just like, you know, in a football game, if someone misses a block on the offensive line, there's someone who's free and clear to hit that quarterback. But if someone misses a block, and you come over off your block to try and pick up that person, you're leaving a hole too. So you know, it seems to me like is it really coming back to that same thing, you need a good foundation of a team, you can trust a team that skilled at what you ask them to do, and a team that's trained in the way that you want them to do their tasks.

I mean, look, I didn't mean my original company. By accident, I mean, back when I was a staff person, from a different idea of an industry and I was trained to do new patient marketing, I didn't go to school for new patient marketing. I was trained and I'm a product of consulting myself and the reason why I do consulting today is because I worked for a doctor many many years ago in my youth right maybe in my youth I said my youth the young days who basically saw diamond in the rough and invested a lot of money in me for consulting and I thought I had no idea fixed ideas in my head about consulting as being bad or whatever I just ended up I thought it was great. I thought it was a game I liked all the all the ideas up I want to implement everything and it worked right so all these years later I recommend every doctor listen to this get your staff trained first of all I said before having the right people in the right places doing the right things I mean I said it before in a future personally earlier episode noise checking scans you might say that some of this stuff bears repeating because you know what? It doesn't sink in the first time. Right? These are some of the things I talk about all the time over and over and over again. I have the same time the same clients for 15 or 20 years hearing the same thing for me oh there's Mike mentioned that you don't get why you're not doing it. Right. So that's why it starts at that because it makes your life that easy. And we don't we invest a little time in that. And we wonder why it's so stressful on me Why am I doing everybody else's job? Why do I have to do this? You know, why does it take me to take care of this kind of thing? No more even for the simplest things you're walking around shutting things down and the other night making sure all the equipment's off why all these little things that's it every anybody blows out of their stroke at six o'clock, right and your little 789 10 o'clock at night, you know doing reports, charts, things like that things you should have been doing during the day that you didn't do because you were doing something else during there but so it starts and ends with your team. But how much time do we really put in team and invest in doing that? You know, you kind of and I still want office the way see how much you pay him is one of the front desks we just sitting there, you know, who barely has no communication skills, and no dental background. Oh, she was a steal only pair $14 an hour. I say well, that's great. 14 bucks an hour and she's costing you hundreds, maybe 1000s of dollars an hour sitting there and you're saving money that way. If you're not that's not an error you want to skimp on.

You get what just like anything else in life, you get what you pay for. Now, I'm not saying just throw money to standard English even worth it, okay, but there's ways to find out that these people are worth it and they can prove their worth and their value. So For a few bucks an hour, if you if it's going to give you freedom and sanity and less and less stress and save your mental health, physical health over time, why not do it, but again, because doctors don't have to hire this is there's an art and science to hiring, attracting good people, even when these times when it's so difficult, you know, to find people, right, but it's gonna get better. And it is starting to shift. But it's been very hard. Right now more than ever to staff offices, right to do that, but but it starts and ends with staffing. And because you can't do this without a team, right. And if you want to, if you want to be a solo person doing it all yourself single handily, great do that. Make 200,000 in production produce produce 20,000 a year in a one room office, and that's what you're going to get. But if you want to really grow and expand and have a thriving booming practice, you know, make more revenue want to make, right you have to have a team in place, and you got to put time and attention and energy into them. And if you don't know what, what am I gonna teach you, right here, you don't make this stuff up yourself. If I told him, if I told you that lesson today and your staff meeting, you're going to take everybody into the operatory and start showing them how to do a one service composite. You could teach him that, right? You could probably teach him the mechanics of how to do that, because you've done it 1000s upon 1000s and 1000s of times your expert with it and making you become marginally not legally but they can become marginally proficient in doing one service composites, right. Like, for example, I use my wife is an example. He was an ortho for 30, almost 30 years, she started before she can work for come up working for me, right? She started when she was 15 years old in the practice. And she started with an old time orthodontist who basically from day one, she knew nothing. She was an assistant, he became certified, he became registered. And in the interim, he taught her how to do orthodox. Okay, so just just so you just knew it. That was the fourth the point where 30 years later when she finally left there and arm was falling off from repetitive motion injury, or whatever, she could put braces on patients better than anywhere else coming out of dental school, you know, which wasn't wasn't honest, was crazy, right? $100 an hour, she's getting paid 30.

So what's not working in this situation is one and whatever. But she could master that craft before that because she was mentor, and she was trained. And she was an asset to that practice. Because you know what, when she moved into a management position, and she was doing sales, right, she's the coach, she was in a big facility, she used to close 678 starts a day paid in full. And she was talking to these moms. And she also had all their orthodontics done by the dentist, and she'd smile and say I want your smile. But she could speak clinically intelligently about everything as if she was a doctor, because she knew orthodontics clinically, inside now, so you could teach people that but so you if you took the time, you can teach people that, right. But the other slip by that point, it is more office managers training school is because it doesn't exist. There's no school students out there other than people like me, I'll just say only me, there's no other consultant and you can't teach this kind of stuff, right? You have to, you have to go back to school and say, like, I don't know what I want to teach, I know it needs to get better here. And I need to run this place. But here we go, I'm gonna invest some time and money in bringing an expert and expert people in to train the hell out of my people and give me the systems and power and the How to to do this. Rather than let me just I heard a school, it's supposed to be this way, I read something somewhere that may be possibly to say you should possibly, you know, answer the phones or junior patients, they think you're not going to be satisfied. And again, you're going to left feeling that you have to do it yourself. And again, you're still inventing ways of doing it. Because again, this is not your area of expertise, not by any stretch of the imagination. So worth the investment, for sure.

But I think, you know, as always, we've flown through a 30-minute session that seemed like it went by in a blink. And while I'm sure there's plenty more. Yeah, we probably fit in an hour's worth of information than these half hour sessions

Easy. We're recording this right now. But when they listen to it, they can play it back on slow play and get a word, right.

Right. But for all those of you out there watching, if you have questions, problems in your practice, send them into us my email and Mike's email are both on the screen for you to see. If you'd like to try coaching on demand, you can go visit dental coaching on demand comm there's a code down on the screen as well that you can use to try it out. Mike, we're glad to have you back. Glad that you're healthy again, and looking forward to talking about some more topics with you. So please, if you want to have a question answered, let us know. But we've got a long list of other topics to cover. So we'll be back soon with another edition of 30 minutes of therapy.

Yeah, so thanks for joining us and in case you want to be on the show, but you've heard about that, you know we can put our virtual couch. It is a dentist that it wants to be on our show one time, we love We love to talk to you and you can bring you can bring your problems lie down, stand up, sit down, whatever you like to do, and I'll take on whatever you got One of the shirts with me give you a lot of fun.

I think that would be great. So please be in touch. Let us know. So for Dental Products Report, I'm Noah Levine for Staff Driven Dental and Coaching on Demand. He's Mike Massotto. Thanks very much for watching.

Videos

Dental practice coach Mike Massotto joins editorial director Noah Levine for 30 minutes of practice help and advice. In this episode, Mike and Noah discuss how to delegate tasks to keep everyone in the practice happy and busy. 

30 Minutes of Therapy - Episode 18 - Becoming Better at Delegating Tasks

Podcasts

Welcome to the first episode of ProductBites, a new podcast from Dental Products Report. In this weekly series, we'll cover the latest product releases from the dental industry. 

In this episode, we’ll take a look at the new combination furnace from Ivoclar Vivadent, a new nitrous oxide nasal hood, a pocket-sized translation device that breaks down language barriers, and a sensor positioner that features an infection control barrier. 

ProductBites Episode 1

Pac-Dent Acquires JS Dental Manufacturing.


Dental product and device manufacturing company Pac-Dent has announced its acquisition of endodontic manufacturing company, JS Dental Manufacturing. This acquisition is said to demonstrate Pac-Dent’s commitment to expanding its endodontic portfolio, according to a press release from the company.

“Our acquisition of JS Dental Manufacturing, Inc. will allow us to expand the selection of endodontic products we are able to offer our dealers,” said Pac-Dent Senior Manager of Sales & Marketing Leika Bishop in the press release. “We look forward to seeing the positive impact this acquisition makes on our business, as well as our business partners.”

Pac-Dent was founded in 1992 and delivers products in preventative, teeth whitening, endodontic, and infection control areas. JS Dental Manufacturing serves as a provider for high quality endodontic products for the practice, per the company’s website.

This acquisition aims to expand practices’ access to a wider variety of products and to better serve Pac-Dent’s network.

Pac-Dent will acquire JS Dental Manufacturing to expand its endodontic portfolio. 

Pac-Dent Acquires JS Dental Manufacturing

Dental Cementation Materials: Getting the Best Out of a Sticky Situation. Photo courtesy of Viacheslav Lakobchuk / stock.adobe.com. 

Dental cement is a workhorse material in many dental operatories. From cavity linings to fixing prosthodontic appliances to orthodontic applications, dental cements have many uses. As a result, there is no shortage of options to choose from. Here are a few things to know about dental cement when selecting the one that works best for you.

Each type of dental cement has its advantages and disadvantages. Nathaniel Lawson DMD, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Director, Division of Biomaterials UAB School of Dentistry divides cement into 2 categories: glass ionomer-based cement and adhesive resin cement.

Dr Lawson explains that glass ionomer, including resin-modified glass ionomer, (RMGI) cement is the most commonly used cement for zirconia and metal-based restorations. He says glass ionomers have the advantage of ease of use, moisture tolerance, and fluoride release. However, the disadvantage of glass ionomer types of cement is that they are not as retentive as adhesive resin cement. 

"They are composed of polyacrylic acid and fluoroaluminosilicate glass," Dr Lawson explains. "The polyacrylic acid allows a chemical bond between the glass ionomer and calcium in the tooth. The fluoroaluminosilicate glass allows fluoride release."

Adhesive resin cement is very similar to the resin composites used for direct restorations, per Dr Lawson. He says the difference is that most adhesive resin cements are less viscous than resin cements, and most are dual-cured. Adhesive resin cements are the most common cements for glass-based restorations, such as lithium disilicate or porcelain. The advantage of resin types of cement is they provide more retention and reinforce the crown material. In addition, adhesive resin types may be used with a separate tooth primer or without a tooth primer. The latter are known as self-adhesive resin cements, Dr Lawson explains. 

"Similar to resin composites, resin cements bond to the tooth through a hybrid layer," Dr Lawson says. "When used with a tooth primer, the tooth primer creates the hybrid layer. Self-adhesive cements can form a very thin hybrid layer due to the incorporation of acidic monomers in the cement."

Dental cement has a defined role in your restorations. For direct restorations, you can use it as a temporary or a cavity lining to protect the pulp. In indirect restorations, it is a luting agent that fills the space between your prep and the restoration.

The ideal properties of cement are also defined, which include:

However, these properties differ greatly between cement. Per the 

, the types of cement varied in elastic moduli and compressive proportional limit, resilience, strength, and toughness. They also varied in diametral tensile and flexural strength and toughness. Moreover, the researchers learned that storage time affected their flexibility differently, with the most significant increases in the glass ionomer types of cement over time.

Making the Right Choice for Dental Cement Depends on Many Variables

It is incumbent on clinicians to determine which type of cement is best for each case. However, Jason Goodchild, DMD, Vice President of Clinical Affairs for Premier Dental Products Company, says some prep factors influence your cement choice based on the clinical situation. For example, your ability to isolate the area could drive your choice because you can't bond without isolation. In that situation, you would choose something more moisture tolerant, like a glass ionomer-based material.

"Bonding should be done in a well-controlled environment. You can't bond effectively when saliva and blood are present.In the cases where you cannot isolate effectively and you are doing the best you can, glass ionomer is more forgiving. Resin is not so forgiving in those environments," Dr Goodchild says.

The tooth's preparation is another factor in your decision. Dr Goodchild says a prep with at least 4 millimeters of occlusal-gingival height and between 10 and 20 degrees of taper gives you the freedom to choose almost any kind of cementation you want. When things aren't perfect in the prep, you have less options.

"If you have the right height and the right taper, you can use almost any type of cement. But if you don't have the enough height or the prep is over tapered, then the prep should be considered nonretentive. So, you might need the strength of a resin in a case like that because we know that resin is stronger than glass ionomer," Dr Goodchild says.

Moreover, there are a variety of different dental cements from which to choose. Dr Goodchild says the wide selection of cementation products can be confusing. For example, there are adhesive resins and self-adhesive resins, glass ionomers or RMGIs, and some cements have a light cure component while some do not, and some claim to be bioactive. All of these types of dental cement have features that provide advantages and present some disadvantages. Therefore, understanding the pros and cons of each and where they fit into the spectrum of cementation is essential.

"Also, you have to read the directions, just like any product in dentistry. All cements and bonding agents are not the same, so we need to understand the nuances. The folks that brought them to market, the manufacturers, and the chemists design them a certain way, and the directions reflect that. If we use them the right way, we should expect excellent results," Dr Goodchild says.

Most dentists want an easy, one-size-fits-all solution for cementation.Dr Goodchild says the self-adhesive resin cements sometimes called ‘universal’ want to be the Goldilocks approach to cementation.However, despite the name, universals don't work for every clinical situation, so Dr Goodchild uses a different approach, which he describes as an If-Then Equation. He sees it as a pragmatic approach to shifting variables, from prep conditions to substrate to restorative materials used.

"If I have this, then I should use that. So, if I have a nonretentive prep, I really should use something strong like resin. If I have a retentive prep, a perfect situation, then I'll use anything I want," Dr Goodchild explains, adding that the approach works with materials, too. "If I am using glass-ceramic, then resin cement. We know that. We also know that with thicker glass-ceramic restorations, you can sometimes get away with glass ionomer. If zirconia, then based on the height of the prep and the retentiveness, I choose glass-ionomer or resin."

When it comes to preparing the intaglio of the restoration, the substrate being used and the type of cement you choose may dictate how you prepare it, Dr Goodchild says. There are many types of substrates, including glass ceramics, zirconia or alumina, porelain-fused-to-metals (PFMs), Gold, and even resins. Clinicians need to know how to pre-treat them. For PFMs restorations in the past, Dr Goodchild said clinicians didn't have as much to do besides make sure it was clean. However, there are pretreatment issues to manage with ceramics, which Dr Goodchild says work with the If-Then approach. For example, if you have glass containing ceramic, then you etch it and silanate it. If you have zirconia, you sandblast or cleanse it, and then if resin is being used you should also prime it with an acidic phosphate monomer.

There is no shortage of options for the cement material you choose. Here are a few things to know about dental cement when selecting the one that works best for you. 

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