CEREC^® is an acronym for "chairside economical restorations of esthetic ceramics".

The CEREC^® procedure allows our dentists to remove only the damaged tooth structure and replace it with a precision, milled, porcelain filling that fits like a "puzzle piece". www.cereconline.com

Why CEREC^®?

• Conserves your natural enamel

• Avoids the need for a full "crown" 90% of the time

• Treatment can be completed in ONE appointment

• The most biocompatible material to date (This porcelain has many of the same properties as human enamel.)

• This technology has been clinically studied for over 20 years. In clinical studies it has proven to be as long lasting as gold and yet it is the most cost-effective restoration available today.

• No messy impressions or temporary crowns to worry about.

• Naturally beautiful tooth-colored restorations

• Unquestionably, much easier than any "crown" procedure.

THE STEPS IN A TYPICAL CEREC® THAT WAS DONE IN OUR OFFICE.....

The following picture is the typical kind a problem that we treat with a CEREC® porcelain filling, instead of a crown. In this first picture, you can see that we have a tooth with an old silver filling, but most of the tooth is beautiful and healthy. It would be a shame to shave this tooth down to a "stump", which is what is necessary if we wanted to put a crown on it. The main advantage of CEREC® is that it will allow us to restore this tooth without touching the part of the tooth that is still strong and healthy.

1. This tooth below has some serious problems: it has decay in-between the teeth (which can only be seen on the X-ray) and you can clearly see how "blue-gray" the tooth looks around the silver filling. We always find decay under these blue-gray areas. There is also a crack that extends from the old silver filling down the side of the tooth, at 7 o'clock. Fractures are a very commonly associated with old silver fillings. You can also see that the filling is surrounded by a black "ditch."

2. The photo below was taken immediately after the silver filling was removed. You can see the brownish-orange decay that was present under the filling. This type of problem is almost always found under fillings that have been in place for more than 25 years. Unfortunately, it is not often evident on X-rays because X-rays can't pass through metal. For this reason, in our office, we do not wait to repair a tooth like this. The blue-gray hue around an old filling is enough to tell us that trouble exits.

3. The photo below shows how the tooth was shaped after we removed all the decay. You can see that we have left more than half of the tooth untouched and we have only removed the tooth structure that was decayed or left too thin. The photo below is taken from the screen of the CEREC® computer. After this photo was taken, the CEREC® milling machine will fabricate a precise piece of porcelain that restores the tooth to its original shape and strength.

4. The photo below shows the finished, nearly invisible, restoration. The procedure took less than one hour. The "drilling time" was less than 4 minutes. The whole process was completed in one visit without putting the patient through messy impressions or temporary crowns. For many people, the experience is simply a "non-event" and as quickly as the next day they feel as though nothing happened!

How does it work?

With just three simple steps!

STEP 1.

To be sure that you are perfectly comfortable, we will use a uniquely gentle technique to numb the tooth that needs repair.

Then we will remove only the defective filling and decay. (This is much more conservative than a conventional crown. With CEREC^® Technology, we can leave much more of your healthy enamel untouched.)

After we are finished with this step, your tooth will often be missing something shaped like a puzzle piece.

STEP 2.

With a very small camera connected to a computer, we acquire a picture of your tooth

The computer then searches its database of thousands teeth, and it determines how your tooth should be shaped if it was back to it's earliest healthy state. A 3D image of your tooth, perfectly restored, will appear on the screen. The doctor approves of this or edits it slightly.

Once finalized, the information is then wirelessly sent to a machine on-site that uses diamond-coated instruments to precision mill the doctor's design from a small ceramic (porcelain) block. This milling process takes 10-15 minutes.

STEP 3.

After milling, the new restoration is checked for perfect fit. (Within 50-100 microns: this is close to the width of a human hair.)

We then bond this restoration to your remaining tooth with a unique light; a process that unites porcelain and tooth to the maximum extent possible.

Lastly, we complete a final polish that ensures a natural appearance making the porcelain blend with your tooth.

A FEW OTHER CEREC® CASES FROM OUR OFFICE......

Here on the left we have a photo of an old silver filling and on the right is a photo of the decay that we found when we removed it.












The photo on the left shows the puzzle piece that was missing after we removed all the decay.

And the final invisible restoration.

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1.The filling ...... 2. The decay.... 3. The preparation.. 4. The final CEREC^®

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1. The filling...... 2.The decay ..... 3. The preparation.. 4. The final CEREC^®

We have literally hundreds and hundreds of photos like these of our patients' teeth, beforeand after repair: every possible configuration of CEREC restoration. Please call for an appointment if you would like us to evaluate the state of your older silver fillings. If they were placed more than 20 years ago, it is likely that you have a number of teeth in this condition. We have intra-oral cameras in every room which we will use to show you your teeth in an effort to partner with you for the best possible outcomes.