Dental Lab Struggles

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Hyunin1210

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I am going to be a D1 and I am wondering what dental lab requirements most schools have? My parents are dental technicians and I am practicing right now because I am bored. I want to know what parts of dental lab work were the most difficult/annoying. I am going to NYU if you can give me specifics.

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I'm sure every school has different rules about what lab work the students do and what work the lab techs do. For example, we won't cast our own full-cast crowns or RPD framework for patients, but we still learn how to do it. And we don't fabricate crowns or dentures, but we still wax up the denture (I'm sure every school makes their students do that). Everything else is pretty much fair game.

A lot of people hate setting teeth, but I find it relaxing.
Surveying and planning the framework for an RPD can get annoying because you have to draw a lot of information in a very small amount of space.

If you just hang out in the lab and learn how a lot of the equipment works, you'll be way ahead of your class.
 
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I'm sure every school has different rules about what lab work the students do and what work the lab techs do. For example, we won't cast our own full-cast crowns or RPD framework for patients, but we still learn how to do it. And we don't fabricate crowns or dentures, but we still wax up the denture (I'm sure every school makes their students do that). Everything else is pretty much fair game.

A lot of people hate setting teeth, but I find it relaxing.
Surveying and planning the framework for an RPD can get annoying because you have to draw a lot of information in a very small amount of space.

If you just hang out in the lab and learn how a lot of the equipment works, you'll be way ahead of your class.

Thank you for the information! I will just learn as much as I can.
 
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The most labor intensive labwork we do is RPD design, and denture/partial tooth setting/waxing. I'm sure you'll end up waxing teeth too, whether for a crown or just to develop comfort holding instruments and learning anatomy. Learning anything about any of those will be an advantage.

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