The importance and evolution of our digital wax up

Diagnostics wax ups have been a tool that we regularly use and encourage, especially in cases where a full anatomic and aesthetic outcome can be determined by patient and Dr.

Traditional diagnostic wax up’s provide an accurate template/guide to patient, Dr and lab to determine a predictable outcome. They can be altered in situ once used as a template for temporaries in the mouth and a final tooth position is achieved.

It is important however to realise providing a wax up of a pre-op model, the preps must be taken into account to ensure that we provide an achievable outcome for the Dr when prepping the patient. We encourage our Dr’s to use the wax up as a temp/prep guide from which am open putty jig can be taken from the wax up and used as a prep reduction guide. This aids in creating enough prep room to achieve the required look.

We have now moved into the digital world where all this is designed and achieved virtually recreating any appearance that is required. Everything is calibrated to the micron rather than an estimate from hand. Our virtual design is then recreated physically in our models for a number of applications such as surgical stents, placement guides, temporary suck-downs, acrylic temps. All these files are stored and can be reproduced at any time.