,A CAD/CAM composite for long-term temporary crowns and bridges that clinicians canv create quickly and easily , ,As a clinician, you probably know the stress of having patients come in with a last-minute dental emergency when you’re about to
close for the weekend. Dr. Sam Halabo and the team at his practice in San Diego, CA, are particularly familiar with that feeling., ,One afternoon, a patient called Dr. Halabo’s practice with an urgent complaint of a “broken tooth.” They fi t him in for an appointment, and soon found out that the patient had lost his 3-unit bridge., ,The team had been hoping that the case would be a simple replacement, but making a temporary by hand or taking an impression, adding denture teeth, and then making a temporary bridge would take a considerable amount of time. Fortunately, Dr. Halabo had an idea. “I thought, let’s do a scan and mill him a temporary made of VOCO’s Structur CAD composite,” he recounted., ,Dr. Halabo began using Structur CAD, a CAD/CAM composite for temporary restorations, several months before the patient’s visit. He had been intrigued by its ability to be used in different clinical scenarios both quickly and esthetically., ,“The material has excellent esthetics with naturallooking shades, easy polishing, and can even be characterized for further-improved esthetics,” noted Dr. Halabo. “I have used the material in many cases, and it’s especially suited for long-term provisional and semi-permanent restorations.”, ,The scan and a simple design for Dr. Halabo’s patient took 10 to 15 minutes. While the bridge was being milled, Dr. Halabo was able to see another patient for a quick procedure., ,“The convenience of Structur CAD allowed us to see all of our patients, give our emergency patient a great-looking temporary restoration to carry him until we could get him a final restoration, and allowed our entire team to leave on time—what a save!”, ,A big advantage of Structur CAD is not having to use a methyl methacrylate (MMA) primer, which can cause skin and eye irritation as well as other adverse health effects. In fact, not using an MMA primer has many benefits, according to Dr. Halabo. “With Structur CAD, intraoral repair is possible. This means adding to, altering, or repairing the temporary restoration is easily and predictably done with common bond and composite,” he explained. “That is the main reason why this material is so versatile.”, ,The ability to precisely mill the material in-office is one of Structur CAD’s unique features—and sets it apart from other materials. “It’s extremely fast and effi cient to mill, does not wear down milling burs, and is easy to polish intraorally or extraorally,” noted Dr. Halabo. “It’s strong and beautiful at the same time.”
