The digital age has reached the mouth cavity

Construction site: a set of teeth

Normally at weekends no work is done at Diospi Suyana’s dental clinic. But early morning on Saturday the whole team (made up of dentists, dental technicians and dental nurses) gathered round a dentist’s chair. The topic of their training session was “taking digital moulds of the mouth”.

Dentist Natalie Valdivia prepared the patient’s affected incisor on which the crown was to be placed. Then the participants practiced scanning the mouth using a digital impression unit. Within seconds the data was transmitted via the internet to our dental laboratory. The modelling of the crown was done on screen. Dental technician Tibor Minge and his colleague Elisabeth Franke watched each process stage most intensely. A CAD-CAM machine, computed-controlled, shaped the individual crown out of a ceramic cube. Dr Valdivia cemented the final product in place. So far so good.

The thankful patient headed home around lunchtime. The dental team had refined their techniques and dentist Nikolaus von Abendroth, who headed the training course, was highly satisfied with everyone’s progress.

Hardly any missionary hospital on the planet can provide high-quality dentures for poor patients. Why then can Diospi Suyana provide this service? Most of our Dental Clinic’s equipment was donated to us and much of the material we use was given to us by companies for free. Missionaries like, in this case, Dr. von Abendroth, Tibor Minge and Elisabeth Franke are supported financially by a private circle of friends. That all of this is possible we believe is a sign of God’s blessing.

The team whilst scanning.
The crown set in place.
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