Intereting Yahoo question on CEREC crowns.

I recently came across a question about CEREC crowns on yahoo that I thought was interesting.

I recently had a Cerec crown put in. I was told how great this was and that they go in take a picture that make a 3d image of the tooth and they send it to the mill that makes it. My understanding was that it was supposed to make this perfect fitting crown.
Well I ended up in the dental chair for about 3 hours. She said she had to pic a generic image from the database because my tooth was so damaged or in bad shape. This seemed odd to me and didn’t make since due to what I was told before. The crown did not fit when it was created. I noticed a lot of red area on the sides on the screen and she was doing a lot of hand manipulation to the 3d model. The crown didn’t filt. She had to hand grind the sides and a lot off the top. It seemed like it really sat up very high. As if it was made way to high. She had to do a lot of grinding to it so it felt natural. It seems like it’s a alittle lower then the surrounding teeth and doesn’t seem to have that natural tooth look. Almost looks a little too smooth. It is also a little wider on the outside at the base then the rest of my teeth. I would have assumed it would been pretty even. Also it seems a little sensitive. I don’t know if that’s normal for a period of time or not. Its been almost a week. It just don’t feel strong. I wonder if it is not seated in properly.
Now when I went to the Cerec site. It seemed as if it was supposed to be a nearl perfect fit. Would pnly take a fraction of the time. And only minor modification if any. I also sen the image of how it looks when they take the image. My tooth looked identical to this, so Im a little concerned why she is saying it was because the tooth was in bad shape as to why they couldn’t fit it right or get a proper model of it. It looks from the site that they could make a copy of the top tooth to know how it would fit. My understanding was this was what they did. But they only took a image of the prepared tooth which again looked like the images in their flash presentation. Did she do something wrong and is trying to cover it up? What about the sensitivity and such?

Here are my thoughts….

This patient definitely needs to see another dentist to have it checked.  A lot can go wrong with a dental crown and I’m afraid this one has some serious problems.  If indeed the crown needs to be replaced, then he dentist the caused the problem in the first place, should pay for the replacement and any other repairs that need to be attended to.

There is something that puzzles me.  This patient said that their dentist had to take a generic image from the database because their tooth was in “such bad shape”.

The CEREC crown system is made to deal with teeth that are in bad shape. Teeth that are in good shape don’t need crowns. The software asks the dentist to input which tooth is being crowned. It in turn gives the dentist a starting point for designing the crown, showing him or her what the tooth is supposed to.  The dentist is also given the images of the surrounding teeth and  opposing teeth. This gives the dentist all the information needed to fit the crown perfectly. Clearly, this dentist didn’t know what they were doing.

This blog is brought to you by Gilbert Dentist Dr. Matt Roper.