Dental Marketing and Practice Management

Jim, this is a good piece of writing. While outsourcing will always be controversial, it also offers opportunities. The trick to using foreign labs is to work with a reputable stateside lab as an access point, and let them do the actual outsourcing. Northwest Dental Labs in Seattle is such a company. I deal directly with them, and they make no bones about outsourcing. Their work is better than what I found locally at a fraction of the cost. I was referred to them by a friend for their consistent quality, not for their prices. I regard them as a competitive advantage for my practice. They certify and guarantee the materials they provide to be as identified. Any reworking is done quickly at their Seattle location, and with DHL shipping, they are very convenient. I am sure there are other choices out there, but they are a great example of a good organization. The first news I had of the current lead scare was a letter from them assuring me that there was no problem with their work, and reminding me of their standards. Having said all of that, I also use some excellent domestic labs for higher end cosmetic and implant cases, and our fees are able to reflect the differences in those costs.

the local lab i use, which i sometimes instruct to send to their lab in china because of costs (the quality of work from china seems to be better than the local labs i use by the way) told me that their research has shown that the lead in the crown in question did not come from the lab in china but instead from a lab in the states that added some stain to the existing crown..said stain being the culprit that contained the lead.

the news media does not usually create accurate news, i have witnessed that in many personal encounters. but it is strange to not hear anyone commenting on this possible source of the lead..

very interesting if true.

dr shlom

Like the clothing, jewelery and many other industries dental labs are likely to get worse. Go ahead sell your country to china and we will see 15 years down the line.
Where your kids will end up!

yes I agree

Well it ’s about time such an article made its way into cyber space . There is no real quality control in Chinese dental labs . I am a prosthodontist having recently returned home to Africa after having worked 3 years in the corporate dentistry arena in Florida ( the kind of corporations that have chains of the cookie cutter dental offices in strip malls throughout the state .) That said it follows that such are largely concern with maximizing short term profits and all lab work was sent through a state side broker to China with spotty results leaving most of my (conscientious )colleagues tearing their hair out especially due to poor quality of removable denture work. It became evident to me that these labs hired ‘technicians ‘ that understood the technical aspects of fabricating something out of plastic but had no training nor understand how to apply it to dentistry. Neither could the state side broker communicate prescriptive instructions to the Chinese.
As far as materials used in the Chinese dental products I have no idea but at the time I was in the US, lead in toys and poison in pet food was raging which was none too comforting to be getting substandard work from China to put in someones mouth . I never told my patients where their work was from for fear of being held liable even though the corporation I worked for gave no alternatives unless one was to spend ones own savings on US labs .
The problem seems multiple fold : where its true that dental schools in the last decade have reduced prosthetic training to a minimum leaving most grads in the dark over the piece of trash they ‘re putting in someones mouth, most older dentists in the US still operating primarily insurance based practices would never be adequately remunerated by insurance companies to pay the mom & pops state side labs for better work . And the latter DO produce better work . It ’s difficult to believe what the above replies stating they have found chinese labs do better work than those in the US. That ’s impossible given the personal attention afforded by a tech that can come over to the office and see what you are talking about ( not to mention speak English ) but I suspect that like a lot of colleagues I worked with out there , if it isnt going in your own mouth and the patient tolerates it AND most important the bottom line is helped not hurt — no one needs to know . Hey, I ‘m not pointing fingers I also sent work to China and could not afford to use my savings to pay local labs (unless the trash from China just was not working out .)
Incidentally I happened across this site while searching for a dental chair from reputable chinese dental companies that are not fly by night profiteers. Their chairs and equipment LOOK good and are a fraction of the US and European versions however because my training I do plan to have my own dental lab and do my own prosthetic work.