The Dawson Academy Blog

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I want to spend a few minutes today discussing the benefits of utilizing a Lucia Jig to make a differential diagnosis. All right. Here's what I mean by that. Many times, you're going to have patients that come in the door, and they're going to be complaining about TMJ pain.

Hi, everybody. My name's Dr. Leonard Hess. I'm one of the senior faculty members here at the Dawson Academy, and I'd like to spend a few minutes talking with you about where occlusal splints work into a treatment plan when we're talking about doing larger or more complicated treatment plans. Let's really take a moment and break our splints down into two predominant types of appliances.

Hi. My name is Dr. Leonard Hess. I'm a senior faculty member at The Dawson Academy, and I'd like to spend a few minutes with you today discussing some of the frustrations that we experience as restorative dentists when it comes to communicating with our dental laboratory. And more specifically let's focus in on the frustrations that we experience when we feel like we're not getting back what we wanted from the dental laboratory.

Cone beam CT technology is really starting to increase in its utilization within our profession, and it's been steadily increasing over the last decade as the ability to have a CT scan unit in our office is becoming more affordable and more predictable. One of the more common question we get is when should we be utilizing a CT scan?

Hi, everybody. My name is Dr. Leonard Hess. I am one of the senior faculty members here at the Dawson Academy, and I would like to take a few minutes to discuss with you when to use an NTI appliance and when not to.

Splints are more than just a piece of plastic you give to patients when you don't know what else to do with them

Occlusal splint therapy can be a great treatment option for those suffering from occluso-muscle disorders and TMD. Given the wrong type of appliance, however, splint therapy can actually do more harm than good for our patients. With an improper or poorly fabricated device, patients can develop increased pain to the joint, an open bite and other serious implications.

I'd like to spend a few minutes with you discussing case acceptance and how do we increase case acceptance, working around the limitations of insurance.

Why is the physiologically correct position in centric relation the most superior position in the joint space itself?

Now, if you're like me and you went through dental school earlier, maybe 20 years ago, you were probably taught that centric relation was actually a distalized position of the condyles.

It was a very frustrating experience not only for the dentist, but also for the patients because you're trying to put the mandible and the condyle into a very unnatural position.