 | The theme of the meeting is “Technological Breakthroughs in Implant Dentistry.” Is technology progressing at a faster rate than science? We are in a challenging time in dentistry today and clinicians are constantly faced with decisions on utilizing new innovations and providing well documented science-based treatment for their patients. How do we assess what is science based and what is marketing? Our speakers will provide answers to these important issues. |
The 2003 Annual Meeting of the Academy of Osseointegration was the first joint meeting held by the Academy, the American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons (AAOMS), the American Academy of Periodontology (AAP) and the American College of Prosthodontists (ACP). The meeting was terrific and showed how cooperation between these groups could add up to something really special. Highlights of the meeting, which attracted 4800 people, were presentations by Harold Slavkin, the dean of USC and P. I. Branemark, who started it all. The Boston host site was fantastic and everyone really seemed to be enjoying themselves. I have some photos posted for your enjoyment...
The Academy of Osseointegration meeting will be held in New Orleans on March 9-11, 2000. More information is available at the AO web site.
The American College of Prosthodontists is hosting their annual meeting in New York this year. For more information, check out the ACP site at http://www.prosthodontics.org/session/indexsession.htm
American Association of Oral & Maxillofacial Surgeons. 1999 Implant Conference... Decembert 3-4, 1999. Chicago Illinois.
Florida Prosthodontic Association
The Florida Prosthodontic Association meeting was held august 27-29, 1999 at South Seas Plantation on Captiva Island, Florida. The meeting was excellent and featured speakers such as Patrick Lloyd, Parker Mahan and Felix Pages. The theme of the meeting was the dental treatment of the Elderly patient and it was indeed a very interesting and informative symposium
Tufts Reunion
My 30th reunion from Tufts School of Dental Medicine will take place the weekend of April 30 to May 2, 1999. I'm looking forward to seeing some of my old classmates there.
Update: Unfortunately both my wife and I got sick the day before the reunion so we missed it... I'm now looking forward to the 60th....
ICOI Implant Prosthodontic Symposium August 14-16, 1998
The first annual ICOI Implant Prosthodontic Symposium was held in Dearborn, Michigan on August 14-16, 1998. I was honored to be among the excellent speakers at this meeting. This section of the ICOI was started by Tom Ford and promises to be one of the premier sections to the ICOI. I will try to get more information about the program up here in the near future.... SRD Academy of Osseointegration March 5-7, 1998
Just got back from a thoroughly enjoyable AO meeting in Atlanta. Mel Schwarz did an outstanding job as program chairman. I'll give you my views on some of the program and I would encourage all of you to try to attend next years meeting in Palm Springs... The corporate forums were held right before the official opening of the meeting. Seven companies sponsored speakers. I attended the Astra Tech presentation and the Friatec presentation. I was disappointed in the Astra Tech presentation because it was more of "My Implant is Better Than Your Implant". The Friatec presentation was, however, outstanding because David Garber and Maurice Salama showed wonderful dentistry... Dentistry which was actually independent of any system. And, even though they ended up plugging their sponsor, the audience (which was packed to the gills) appreciated the excellent work that had been presented.
The remainder of the first day was the symposium on Clinically applied Biometric Research. For a lot of technical stuff, the presentations were very interesting and informative, especially Stuart Froum's presentation on Sinus Graft Procedures.
On the second day, I bypassed the main hall lectures and sat in on two limited attendance clinics. Scott Ganz an excellent presentation on computer graphics and incorporating them into your presentations. David Gelb did a wonderful presentation on Immediate Implant Placement Protocol. The afternoon lectures were a bit more of my implant is better than yours, Professor Willi Schulte, who was honored by the academy, leading the way....
The highlight of the last day, although I must confess that I left before the afternoon Implant Controversies discussion, was the VA study update which basically confirmed that experience is probably one of the biggest factors in implant success... SRD
American College of Prosthodontists (Nov. 5-8, 1997)
The theme of this year's meeting was NARROWING THE GAP between the prosthodontist, the patient and the technicians. There were two sub-themes: Dental Aesthetics and Dental Implants. There is a major move for Prosthodontists to place dental implants. Almost every speaker in the implant forum placed their own implants. Tom Balshi gave an opening lecture entitled Implant Surgery for the Prosthodontic Practice which totally blew me away! He's doing nerve repositionings and onlay block grafts and they looked as good as anyone else's. But the lecture that probably had the most impact at the meeting was Dan Sullivan's Top 10 Reasons Why Prosthodontists Should do Their Own Surgery. Dan made some excellent points for the prosthodontist to do implant surgery. It crystallized what I have been doing and saying for the past eight years. I'm sure there will be a lot of interesting discussion following this meeting...
American Academy of Implant Prosthodontics
"Prosthetic Topics in the Tropics"May 25-30, 1997
Maui, Hawaii!
This was a GREAT meeting! Maui was beautiful and the Ritz Carleton was superb. Definitely looking forward to next year which I hear will be in Aspen....
DENNIS TARNOW - NOVA SOUTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY- MARCH 1997
Our newest dental school, Nova Southeastern University, College of Dental Medicine has started right in on its continuing education program well in advance of actually training any dental students. Today the hosted Dr. Dennis Tarnow, the director of NYU's Implant program. Hi talk was Controversies and Innovations in Implant Dentistry and it was delivered extremely well as Dennis always does. As program chairman for the AO meeting (see below) he should have penciled himself in to do more of the lectures in San Francisco....
Dr. Tarnow addressed almost all of the controversies in implant dentistry today. He has a very sound and rational approach to implant dentistry and placed his points well across to the sellout audience. Dr. Tarnow stated that while most of the original Brånemark concepts don't hold up as well as when they were originally presented, care and good judgment should always be exorcised when working with dental implant supported restorations. The leading causes of failure of dental implants are OVERLOADING and PERI-IMPLANTITIS. While smooth titanium implants usually avoid the problems of peri-implantitis, there is an increasing desire to have a rough surface implant in the bone, especially in type IV situations or sinus lifts.
Dr. Tarnow recommends freeze dried mineralized bone over the de-mineralized variety for most grafting procedures. He made a very valid presentation of the role of biological width in implants dentistry and discussed wide diameter implants and immediate implant placement. Dr. Tarnow's preference in placing implants in an extraction socket is to wait at least two to three months after extraction to place the implant.
ACADEMY OF OSSEOINTEGRATION - MARCH 1997
Just Back from the Academy of Osseointegration meeting in San Francisco.... San Francisco was great, but the meeting was fairly dull. There were a dozen really good presentations, but they were all held at the same time so you only got to see one of them...
I was looking forward to the presentation of the Sinus Graft Consensus Conference, but I don't know much more today about the success and longevity of sinus grafts with implant placement than I did before the meeting. Still the best estimates are 85% implant success rate in sinus lifts pretty much regardless of what you use...
One really outstanding presentation was by Dr. Üli Grunder of Switzerland entitled LONG-TERM ESTHETIC RESULTS. This presentation restored my faith in what can be achieved with dental implants in terms of fit, form and function. Dr. Grunder places and restores the implants himself and use the Brånemark System. Throughout the meeting, I was getting a little insecure and feeling that I was missing out on something by not trying other types of implants, but after Dr. Grunder's presentation, I woke up and reaffirmed that it is the dentist, not the implant that is the key....
Dr. Craig Misch, just filling in for a missing presenter gave an outstanding discourse on implant placements with bone grafts. Dr. Misch is a prosthodontist who is currently training as an oral surgeon. This young man is good! Look out Carl....
I'll have some more information about this meeting in a few days....