tips and tricks

During my free time I spent a little while playing around with waxing up anatomy on a set of models which taught me a lot about anatomy and the handling of wax. Below are some tips I thought of at the time: -Use good quality wax. Better quality wax will have the ideal melting properties and strength to allow ease of use and longevity. You don't want the melting point it too high as it will solidify before you place the wax. Too low and it will be too runny and will take too long to solidify making your waxup take much longer. -The model need to be very dry before you wax up onto it or the wax won't stick and will come off with manipulation or the creation of a putty stent -Use fine instruments to place the wax as they are more precise. For a long time I was using a lecron carver because that was all that was available for I trialled using an old, blunt sickle probe with good results. -Set up your work station for maximum efficiency. Keeping your instruments arranged neatly

I've heard it so many times before where someone says "well it's only the primary impression so it's fine" or "it's good enough". I do take issue with this line of thinking because it raises the question of: When is "good enough" acceptable? I would argue that we should be trying to do the best quality dentistry at every stage of the process or our results will suffer. If our primary impressions are bad, our special trays and planning will be compromised. Inaccuracies carry on down the line. If our cavity preparations are non ideal, our final restorations can't be as good as they can be. Which step is it ok to be bad at? Records such as impressions, bite records, facebows and photos are extremely important. All of the planning occurs based on these records. Planning is the most important part of dentistry because it sets up your appointment sequence, treatment to be done, treatment order. Why do you want to compromise on this most

 So I've just finished up with the last viva for the primary exams this year. I thought I'd jot down a few thoughts about the journey while I'm here.   -This year the exams were online which is the first time this has happened. I didn't experience any glitches or dropouts and the process was well organised and streamlined. I don't know how I would have done with a hand written exam as my hand writing is both slow and poorly legible. I found the typing to be a bonus. The program they used for the exams watched you through the webcam and would flag moments that your eyes were away from the screen or you were talking and this would be reviewed by the examiner during marking. -On reflection, last year there were multiple factors that led to my resignation of the exams. Firstly I hadn't paid for them so was studying for the exams without the obligation of actually being locked into doing them. Although I could maintain a heavy level of study, ultimately it gave the a

I was thinking during a walk today about an impression I had to take a while back where the 18 was very buccally tilted and overerupted. The issue was that the largest impression tray wasn't large enough to get around this abnormally positioned tooth and the tray wasn't seating. During my walk I asked myself what are the possible solutions to this problem. I cam up with a few: 1. Take a bad impression: Take an impression with a very overfilled tray and hope to get enough detail for what you want to achieve. The issue is the material around the 18 is unsupported and is likely to tear when you withdraw the impression, the differences in impression material thickness will result in inaccuracy and the tray seating onto a hard surface will cause rebound of the tray when you remove it resulting in further inaccuracy 2. Soften the tray in a flame and widen the tray around the tooth: This is what I did in the aforementioned situation. I used a bunsen burner to heat the tray in the