Recent courses

In December of 2010, I took a course on “Ceramic Science 2010.” As dentistry moves away from porcelain in many cases, it’s especially important to keep up on the developments in high-strength dental ceramics. These materials are used more and more as a replacement for porcelain-fused-to-metal in crowns. Porcelain and ceramics are both used for veneers; each material has advantages and disadvantages.

The lecturer, from NYU dental school, had a tremendous amount of new information on choosing the best dental ceramic for specific needs, and how to make ceramics perform to their optimum potential. A good course, and information every cosmetic dentist can use every day.

 
Recent courses in cosmetic dentistry

We’ve all been busy with continuing education recently. In March we all received our CPR training update. While I was away attending a course in Boston, the staff had a one-day in-service on enhancing their knowledge of our computer dental software.

I attended a three-day course on “State of the Art Cosmetic Dentistry.” I absolutely love this speaker (I take an average of 70 hours of continuing education per year, so I’m pretty hard to impress); the extent of his knowledge is most impressive.

Have you ever heard a talk in which the speaker was brilliant but just had trouble getting the message across clearly? This speaker organized his material so well and so clearly that I learned a tremendous amount of new information from him. You could almost look around the room and see dentists thinking to themselves, “Oh, now I finally understand this concept!”

As a result of this course, we’ll be changing the way we approach your checkups. We’ll sometimes be taking photos of your mouth at the start of your checkup, showing you the photos, and asking you if you see anything that concerns you. It’s a way of involving you much more in the diagnostic process. The more we know about your wishes, the better we can fulfill them.