CEREC Single Day Crowns in Vestal, NY

The crown itself is rarely what people complain about. It is everything around it. The tray of impression putty you have to hold still for. The temporary that comes loose on a bagel. The two or three weeks of chewing on one side. Then a second appointment, a second round of numbing, and another half day off work.

CEREC removes all of that. We scan your tooth digitally, design the restoration on screen while you sit there, mill it out of a solid block of ceramic in our own office, and bond it in place the same day. One appointment, start to finish, with the permanent crown.

Vestal Dental Associates was instrumental in bringing CEREC to the Southern Tier, and we have been refining how we use it ever since. It is not a novelty here. It is how we do crowns.

What Actually Happens in a Single Day Crown Appointment

CEREC stands for Chairside Economical Restoration of Esthetic Ceramics, which is a mouthful for a simple idea: the lab work happens here instead of somewhere else.

Your dentist prepares the tooth the same way they would for any crown, then takes a digital scan instead of an impression. The restoration is designed on screen, and you can watch it happen. Our CEREC Primemill then mills your crown from a single block of dental ceramic, and our Programat CS6 furnace crystallizes, stains and glazes it so the color and translucency match the teeth on either side rather than announcing themselves.

That staining and glazing step is what lets a new crown sit unnoticed beside its neighbors, so we always complete it. Our Learning Center has more on how the Primemill changed what we can do in a single appointment.

Watch How CEREC Works

Two minutes, and it will make more sense than any description.

CEREC Is Not Just for Broken Teeth

The same technology handles a lot more than emergencies:

• Replacing old silver fillings. Large amalgam fillings crack teeth over time as they expand and contract. A CEREC onlay or crown replaces one and reinforces what is left. The Learning Center covers what to know before replacing amalgam.
• Finishing a root canal the same day. A treated tooth needs covering, and we can do the root canal and the permanent crown in one sitting.
• Inlays and onlays. When a tooth needs more than a white filling but less than a full crown, a milled ceramic onlay preserves more of the natural tooth.
• Veneers. CEREC mills veneers for cosmetic cases alongside restorative ones.
• Implant restorations. The crown that goes on a dental implant is milled and customized to your specific implant site.

If a tooth cracks on a weekend or breaks the day before you travel, call us. Being able to finish a crown in one visit is exactly what makes emergency situations manageable instead of a three week project.

Why Patients Across Greater Binghamton Choose Vestal Dental

Same day crowns depend on what sits behind the scanner. Here is what we have brought together.

• The full chain in one building. CEREC Primemill for milling, Programat CS6 for crystallizing and glazing, Orthophos SL 3D imaging for planning. Nothing is sent out. See our knowledge and technology in full.
• Here since 1955. Four generations of Southern Tier families have been treated in this practice.
• The same dentist and the same hygienist, every visit. You are not reassigned to whoever is available that day.
• Dentists who use it constantly. Our doctors hold CEREC Doctors memberships and continue training on the system. Read about the team and what each of them focuses on.
• A short drive from a wide area. Patients come to us from Owego, Ithaca, Endicott, Johnson City and across the greater Binghamton region.

Questions We Hear About Same Day Crowns

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  How long does the appointment actually take?
  Plan on a single appointment rather than a specific clock time, because it varies with the tooth. Preparation and scanning take a portion of it, the mill runs while you wait, and then the crown is stained, glazed and bonded. You can read or work through the milling stage. We will give you a realistic window when we schedule you so you can plan the rest of your day around it.
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  Is a milled crown as strong as one made in a lab?
  The ceramic is the same class of material a lab would use, and it arrives as a single solid block rather than being layered, which removes a common weak point. The crystallization step in our Programat CS6 furnace is what brings the material to full strength, and we do not skip it. For most crowns there is no durability tradeoff for having it done in one day. Where a case genuinely calls for a lab fabricated restoration, your dentist will say so.
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  Will it match my other teeth?
  That is what the staining and glazing step is for. The ceramic block is selected to your shade, then the finished crown is characterized in our furnace to match the translucency and surface detail of the teeth next to it. Matching a single front tooth is the hardest case in all of dentistry, and if yours is one of those, your dentist will talk you through the options before starting rather than after.
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  Do I still need a temporary crown?
  No. That is the point. A temporary exists only to protect the prepared tooth while a lab makes the real one, so when the real one is made in the next room there is nothing to bridge. No temporary means nothing to come loose, no sensitivity while you wait, and no second numbing appointment.
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  Do I have to replace my old silver fillings?
  Not automatically. A sound amalgam filling that is sealed and causing no problems can often be left alone, and we will tell you when that is the case. What does warrant attention is a large filling with cracks radiating from it, recurrent decay at the margin, or a tooth that has started to feel sensitive to pressure. Those are the ones where a CEREC onlay or crown rebuilds the tooth before it fractures.
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  Does insurance cover a CEREC crown?
  Dental plans generally cover a crown based on the tooth and the material, not on where it was made, so a single visit crown is typically covered the same way a lab crown would be. Coverage percentages and waiting periods vary by plan. We will give you a written estimate with your benefits already applied before you agree to anything. Our payment options page lists the plans we work with and the financing available.