Investing in a 3D printer and adding digital workflows to your dental practice can provide a number of benefits. We’ll take a closer look at these benefits below.
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Save Time and Costs
Making a model by hand is time-consuming and leaves room for human error, which can result in additional time and work on the patient’s chair. 3D printing provides a more accurate tool and automation reduces the required labor time, resulting in time and cost savings throughout the dental practice. Less chair time and fewer patient visits gives dental offices more time to see patients, which leads to business growth. Modern 3D printers are designed to be less complex, so they don’t require an in-house specialist technician, so tasks can be delegated to practice staff, leaving dentists with more time for value-added activities. In-house manufacturing of precise and high-quality products saves laboratory costs as well as material and shipping costs, so a 3D printer can provide significant cost savings for dental practices. In addition, laboratories that implement 3D printers are better positioned to adapt to the dental practice and deliver faster and more efficiently.
Improve Patient Experience And Outcomes
In addition to improving dental workflows and saving costs and time, one of the biggest benefits of implementing 3D printers is improved patient experience and treatment outcomes. Dental clinic 3D Printer oral appliances are more conformable than hand-made products, meaning they are more precise and fit the patient better. This translates into a more convenient treatment plan for patients and a faster process that requires fewer and shorter office visits. It also allows for a more individualized care plan for patients. The time savings achieved by in-house manufacturing of devices means they can be manufactured and fitted to a patient in much less time, which can help speed up the treatment plan and improve patient satisfaction.
Expand Your Treatment Options
3D printing and other digital solutions allow dentists to upgrade and streamline a number of processes. There may also be processes that can be implemented that would not have been possible before. 3D printers make it easy to create crown and bridge models, orthodontic models and surgical guides in one smooth process, in a clean and safe work environment.
Use In-House
3D printing allows dentists to do work that would traditionally be done in a dental lab or in-house. This reduces the time it takes for labs to process and ship products and the time it takes to adjust devices that don’t fit properly. Dentsply Sirona’s Primescan is extremely user-friendly and provides dental offices with a method for long-term storage of dental impressions and reproduction of instruments and models when needed. This allows crowns, molds, models and bridges to be produced quickly and easily, which can also be replicated if a replacement is required in the future.
Increase Productivity
Using a 3D printer can help increase productivity in a dental office. Surgical guides, models and splints can be made in-house without waiting in a laboratory. This process eliminates the need to go through the tedious process of acquiring physical models and waiting for material drying time and outsourcing. A 3D digital impression can be taken with an intraoral scanner and the device can be printed within the practice. This allows more devices to be manufactured and means that technicians and practice staff are free to work on other, more productive tasks.