Dental care is like many other projects that we are involved with regularly. All of us need dental care [and often dental treatment] on a regular basis. If we are concerned with good health in general, we visit our oral health care provider at least annually. When considering who is going to provide this health care, we should all be careful. There are many ways to provide dental care and a wide variety of materials and techniques are used to provide this care.
If the best materials and techniques are not used when making parachutes, life jackets or providing dental treatment; the results may not be what the user would like them to be! It is very obvious why you wouldn’t want the cheapest life preserver or parachute, but much less obvious why you wouldn’t want the least expensive dental care available.
At “Smiles of Skokie” Dr. Dave and his Team carefully select and use the best, most cost effective, longest lasting, materials and techniques to provide the best treatment at the most reasonable cost possible. Your Team at our office is constantly taking courses and upgrading materials and techniques to offer our “Dental Family” the best treatment and value available.
Recently we noticed that some of our stock of material, which is still good, wasn’t being used. We discussed this and agreed that we would rather dispose of it than use it for patient treatment when an improved material is available which will work better for our patients now.
We have also been restoring implants without using cement to hold the crowns and bridges in place on the implants for awhile now. There is recent research which shows that in spite of extreme care on the part of the doctor, some minimal cement residue could affect the long term health of the dental implant in some cases. Dr. Dave decided that we will no longer place any implant restorations with cement due to this research. Our implant restorations are extremely successful long term but we want them to be the best possible! [There are advertising, group dental implant “mill” offices which not surprisingly show some questionable results. Be careful!]
We routinely use 2 different types of filling materials when placing white fillings in the back teeth. We are then able to use a material in between the teeth which absorbs & releases fluoride to help prevent decay in this decay prone area; and a stronger, more wear resistant filling material for the chewing surface. This results in the best filling possible. [Is a reduced fee dental office going to go through these extra steps? Will their fillings last as long?]
Our long term, fixed in place, crowns and bridges are when finished, ALWAYS placed with resin bonding material. Many other offices use cements which will leak away in as little as 5 years which can lead to decay under these crowns & bridges or loss of them. The resin bonding material we use has been tested carefully and according to research results, won’t show any significant “wash out” for 3 generations! The resin bonding material is more difficult to work with but we think it is worth using, don’t you?
We also use the best, most cost effective, labs we can find. This results in better, more consistent and comfortable results for you!
Our fees may not be the lowest but our care is among the best available. [Ask friends or relatives, who see another dentist, what their costs are for oral care and ours will usually be less for the same procedures in spite of our higher quality results.] If we were to become a contract provider for dental plans, we wouldn’t be able to provide the quality we must provide for our “Dental Family”. Contract providers are forced to follow a reduced fee schedule which means something has to give somewhere and that is usually reduced quality of care which the patient usually can’t see. We promise to do the best we can for you at the most cost effective fees possible!
Oral health has been shown to greatly influence your general health and well being. Shop elsewhere for bargains if you need to, but invest carefully in your long term dental health!
