CAD-CAM

Our laboratory

A digital workflow - from scan to finished restoration, all under one roof.

CAD-CAM

It all starts and ends here

Our own CAD-CAM lab means the entire workflow - from digital impression to finished crown - stays under the control of the same team. The traditional approach of hand-modelling in wax and casting in metal dominated dentistry for decades, but has now been fully replaced by a digital pipeline that is more accurate, more predictable, and aesthetically superior. Fewer hand-offs, fewer transcription errors, and more control over the final result.

CAD + CAM

CAD plus CAM - two stages, one workflow

CAD stands for Computer-Aided Design - the stage where the restoration is shaped on screen. Technician and dentist together define the contours of the crown, bridge, veneers or implant superstructure, taking into account aesthetics, occlusion and contacts with neighbouring teeth. Everything is visible and adjustable before the first cut.

CAM means Computer-Aided Manufacturing - the automated production of the finished work. Our CNC mill follows the digital design with micron precision, carving the restoration out of zirconia or glass-ceramic blocks. No hand-modelling, no subjective error that used to be unavoidable.

How the whole process unfolds

It starts with the impression. Most often we use an intraoral scanner that digitally captures the situation in the mouth in just a few minutes - no putty, no uncomfortable sensations. When the case calls for it or the patient prefers a traditional approach, a conventional impression is taken and converted into a plaster model in the lab.

The plaster model (or the intraoral scan if a scanner was used) is placed into a multi-camera laser scanner. It captures the geometry from every angle and creates a detailed three-dimensional model that becomes the working basis for every step that follows.

In the design software, the restoration takes shape. Drawing on a vast library of reference shapes, the system proposes an initial design, which we then fine-tune to the specifics of the patient - tooth position, contact points, aesthetic preferences. Every change is visible immediately.

Once the design is finalised, the appropriate block of material goes into the CNC mill - a zirconia disc for the substructure of larger work, an e.max block for veneers or single crowns. The machine carves the restoration with precision measured in microns. For full-ceramic work, this is the last step before cementation.

Zirconia substructures go through one additional process - sintering in a furnace heated to about 1500°C. During this stage zirconia reaches its final strength of over 1300 MPa, significantly higher than natural enamel. Only then is the veneering porcelain layered and the colour characterised, completing the restoration before it returns to the clinic.

What we make in our digital workflow

Our laboratory

See the space and equipment

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