Our office is happy to offer CEREC® crowns and bridges for our patients who have a damaged tooth or want to correct misshapen teeth. With CEREC® crowns by Dr Prabhdeep K Gill DDS, Fresno, California, you can have your tooth restored with a crown in a single visit and walk out with your smile fully restored. Contact us to set up an appointment if you think you may need a crown and want to learn more about the CEREC method.
HOW DOES CEREC® WORK?
- The entire process only takes 2 hours.
- Digital Impressions are created of your mouth in a matter of minutes.
- Creation of ceramic crown using our milling unit ensures accuracy & precision.
- CEREC® Crowns look & feel like a real tooth.
- Aesthetically, there’s no other type of crown that can compete with a CEREC® Crown.
- They can last on average 10-15 years; but if taken care of, they may last much longer like any other restorative material.
- No temporaries, no impressions, and great esthetics.
The traditional vs. CEREC® crown process
The traditional dental crown process typically requires more than one appointment. Traditional crowns can be made of a variety of materials such as all metal, all ceramic, porcelain fused to metal, zirconia or porcelain fused to zirconia. Your dentist will take the following steps for placing a crown on your tooth:
- Take x-rays of your damaged tooth to figure out if you do need a crown and recommend root canal therapy if needed.
- Numb your tooth and file down the edges to make room for the crown. If there’s too much of the tooth missing, your dentist may use a filling material to help the tooth support the crown.
- Use a putty to make an impression above and below your tooth to measure the correct size for the crown so it doesn’t affect your bite or spacing.
- The impression will be sent to a lab where your crown will be made in about two weeks. You may have a temporary crown during the waiting period that’s made of acrylic.
- After the crown arrives at your dentist’s office, you will go in for a second visit to cement the crown on your tooth.
CEREC® crowns only require one appointment. All CEREC® crowns are made from ceramic and can be used for severely decayed, misshapen or broken teeth just like a traditional crown. Your dentist will still take x-rays of your teeth, recommend root canal therapy if needed and file your tooth the same way they would for a traditional crown. For the CEREC crown process, your dentist will do the following after the initial crown preparation:
- Use an intraoral scanner to take photos of your teeth and create a digital impression.
- The impression is sent to the CAD/CAM software machine that then creates a digital tooth restoration.
- The finished restoration is sent to a milling machine that creates the physical crown out of a ceramic block. This process only takes up to 15 minutes.
- Dentist will polish, match the shade of completed crown and then cement it to your tooth.