Investigation of the Dental Technicians' Readiness to Manufacture Dental Prostheses Using Digital Technologies

Abstract

Modern digital technologies allow us to generate a virtual model of the patient and to design his/her smile.  The future definitely belongs to the digital technologies because they offer a reliable,   predictable and highly esthetic manner of treatment. The aim of the present study is to investigate the dental  technicians' readiness to manufacture dental prostheses using digital technologies. Material and methods: A total of 159 respondents - practicing dental technicians and   students - were surveyed using an on-line survey. The survey was conducted via a in the social network platform. Results were processed with SPSS v. 20. using  variational,     comparative and correlation analyzeses.  Results: Over 50% of the respondents people have indicated that they use different types of digital technologies in their practice, the main reason being that the construction time is shortened and that the accuracy is improved (85.20%). There has been a correlation between the length work experience and the use of new technologies (p<0.05), with younger specialists being the ones who primarily use modern technology. Young specialists are willing to invest in the purchase of modern equipment and to attend additional courses on working with it. Conclusions: Despite the variety of methods for recreating the prosthetic field when manufacturing prosthetic constructions, a trend towards full digitalization of the process is observed. The results from the conducted analyses show that digitalization is being increasingly used by young specialists (CAD planning and software application – 78.40%), who prefer it because it increases accuracy and shortens production time (85.40%).