Composite Veneers vs Edge Bonding – Biomimetic Dentistry with George The Dentist – PDP075

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When I see an already beautiful smile plastered with Composite Veneers, it makes me a little bit anxious. I think that maybe the patient just ‘needs’ minor edge bonding and teeth whitening. In our latest podcast, we are very lucky to have such an amazing, high caliber dentist and we get to hear his take on composite veneers. It’s none other than George Cheetham aka George The Dentist. You’ll also get to know a powerful communication/consent tip that I will implement in my workflow straightaway.

Need to Read it? Check out the Full Episode Transcript below!

Protrusive Dental Pearl: I love the Eve Twist Composite Polished by DiaComp (Not sponsored by the way). It’s my favourite polishers in the whole world. If you are looking for a new polishing system for your composites, you should definitely try the Eve Twist. It gives a high lustre relatively quickly. Check them out.

In this episode we discussed:

• Establishing a practice as a young dentist
• George’s take on composite veneers
• Finding your dental niche
• Tips and tricks in managing your case documentation (and social media)
• Dealing with and treating fellow dentists
• Breaking down biomimetic dentistry
• George’s rapid quick fire about anything and everything dental

If you like this episode, you’ll also like Alan Burgin’s Journey with a Young Dentist!

Click here for Full Episode Transcription:

Jaz’s Introduction: 
In the last few years I’ve seen a massive increase in the number of composite veneers we are placing as a profession. Now don’t get me wrong I don’t have anything major against composite veneers it’s just that when I see a beautiful smile blasted with composite it makes me a little bit anxious. I just think a lot of these patients all they need is a bit of teeth whitening maybe a little bit of edge contouring edge bonding and sometimes some orthodontics and I feel perhaps we’ve just stretched it a little bit with this composite veneer kind of trend. But you know what it’s what the patients want so I understand why as a professional we’re doing this. Now the guest I have on today is going to share such huge valuable gems for us. I did promise you in the last episode that I’ve got a complete rock star on today  it is none other than George The Dentist who is just doing amazing high caliber dentistry. I love his social media I love the reflective post that he does on Instagram so I’m just so excited to get this episode out to you we discuss so much like when you have someone like George who’s just such a talented guy there was so much to discuss but one thing that we did discuss was composite veneers and his take on it which I think is really special the way he breaks it down and one tip that he gave is so, so, amazing towards around about two-thirds into the episode that I think this is going to be potentially the tip of the year when it comes to this podcast. It’s something that I’m going to implement in my workflow straight away and maybe I’m late to the party maybe you guys are already doing this but it’s something to do with when you find that patient and you’re going to be having some composite bonding be it edge bonding be it composite veneers be it whatever that upfront conversation that you have about chipping about polishing and the maintenance how do you have that conversation. I think the way that George has that conversation is just sensational and the expectations are laid out the financials of it are laid out and I just absolutely loved it so I’m so excited for you to listen to that one.

Protrusive Dental Pearl
Before we jump into the main episode I want to give you the Protrusive Dental Pearl. It’s related to polishing your composites. I don’t think I’ve used this as a pearl already if I have I’m so sorry it’s my favorite polishes and whole world. This is not a sponsored episode but I love the EVE twist okay so it’s E-V-E twist. I believe they’re made by a German company called diacomp and they’re called EVE twist like even when I was in Singapore I used to like import them from Germany to Singapore they are just my favorite polishes. They’re the pinkish purplish one which is the pre-polish and there’s a white one which really gets such a fine luster. So just using these two polishes I get a great result and it doesn’t take very long at all. So if you’re looking for a new polishing system I try out eve twist and let me know what you think by reaching out to me on the Instagram @protrusivedental. I know you will love it. Now let’s join back to the main interview with George The Dentist where we discuss so many different things as well as the whole composite bonding composite veneer issue we discuss his career progression. We discuss something which is which is pretty interesting and really highlighted the humility that George has which is the fact that he admitted quite openly that extractions are not his forte right? He’s completely okay the fact that you know there’s some areas of densities which he’s good at and I like to say he’s really good at it and he’s he knows where his weaknesses are. And there’s something really beautiful about that so thanks George for sharing it in the way he did it I know you guys will love this and you’ll really appreciate and enjoy his humility that he shows. So let’s just dive right in everything from image management photography to career progression and managing your patience with composite veneers. Ladies and gents, listen up, it’s George The Dentist.

Main Episode:
George The Dentist, welcome to the Protrusive Dental Podcast. How are you my friend?

[George]
I’m very good. Thank you for having me. It’s an honor to be speaking to a reputation such as yourself so thank you. Yeah I’m good I’m good.

[Jaz]
Mate, your reputation is just phenomenal in terms of the kind of content you’re producing on social media which is so educational. And I think that’s why every time I look, you’re growing and followers but that doesn’t matter that the followers we all know that doesn’t matter. But it’s the value that you’re providing and that’s why I think that you have so many followers and it’d be interesting to know what are your followers what percentage are dentists and what percentage are patients. Because I bet you get bombarded with both because part of my journey at the moment is I’m always happy to help other dentists and my Instagram is more for dentist than it is for patients. And keeping up with the DMs it can get quite stressful I remember you shared a story about four or five months ago actually and like you’re like look I’m sorry I’ll get to everyone but there were so many DMs. So I mean your reputation always perceives you that you everyone knows you everyone’s listening to a podcast I’m sure they know who you are but I still want you to do an introduction anyway just brief introduction about yourself and then we’ll talk about how you handle your DMs and then we’ll get into the nitty-gritty things.

[George]
I’m George. People might know me as George The Dentist and that’s how like people say ‘oh hey you’re George the dentist now because of the whole social media thing.’ I’m just a general dentist man, I qualified about 10 or 11 years ago up in newcastle which is a very fun place to study. Came down to London and did my VT year down here. And then started in mixed practice and I started a day a week in a private practice and actually that’s the practice that I’m sitting in right now.

[Jaz]
You know what? Because I was just thinking about how you started a day a week and stuff. And hey let’s do that man. Let’s start with your story first. We’ll get to that stuff later I would love to hear, I’m sure everyone would love to hear your story George.

[George]
So what yeah so basically I am. Yes, I started four days a week after my VT year right. I thought that I want to kind of get better at this job. So I started four days in a kind of mixed practice and I started a day in a private practice. The private practice was not the best run thing in the world i.e. it was kind of been here for a few years as a squat practice. It didn’t have great equipment and that kind of thing we didn’t have any specialist services. And then the mixed practice was my colleagues John and Aaron owned it and I was very lucky to get a place there because they were super enthusiastic about the dentistry that they were providing. They’re endodontist so they were like super keen not on kind of cracking out UDAs or making money but rather the actual quality of the dentistry that you were providing there right so it was actually a really great place that I could learn a lot from the other clinicians that were there and take on board what they had to say they would help provide me with materials and obviously with that came, the way that I see it is that you’ve got to put a few years of practice in where you’re not making much money you know you’re not trying to hit those UDAs, you’re doing your endos. You’re doing like three endos on a patient for three UDAs or whatever but I just see that almost as a right of passage. So I kind of over the next like four or five years I did basically kind of stayed doing that so mostly mixed practice and a bit in private and I did a master’s degree at the same time in aesthetic dentistry. Always going on courses you know weekend courses just trying to get better really. And then as time went on I progressed to kind of narrowing down the NHS but doing more private once I felt that I had. I knew what caries was I knew kind of knew how to deal with it my bonding got better I could put a rubber dam on use a sectional matrix I got a bit slicker at that so I felt that I got to the point where I can actually justifiably kind of charge for this now.

[Jaz]
How many years, George, was that for you?

[George]
I mean we’re always learning right? But I felt that it was the kind of five or six year mark where I could almost kind of really trim down the NHS yeah? And but I was always doing courses. I was always investing in my own equipment so personally I would say to like a younger dentist, don’t worry about the money at the beginning get that out of your head. When you see people on social media doing smile designs and all this and being kind of living this lifestyle I don’t think that you should let that get to you and I think that it takes a lot of time. And it takes time to get good well you’re not earning much money it’s just you’ve got to go through that don’t feel the pressures that you’ve got to be the same.

[Jaz]
100 percent agree. But can I just play devil call. Devil’s advocate with you George. Because a lot of people will be asking this right? I completely agree with you that when you are young when you’re earning your career work to learn not work to earn right? But the barrier that dentists have is especially in mixed practice is the principal who may be putting pressures to say that wait you’re spending 45 minutes on a restoration or whatever or you wait you’re doing an hour and a half for a root canal? How is that going to work?

[George]
So how does one handle that I think that if unfortunately you’re in the situation where you’re getting those pressures and you’re not in a job where the values of the principal are the same as yours, I think the only way of dealing with that situation is finding another job. Or if you’re say doing five days in that practice, maybe you could find still do three days because you’ve got your income maybe try and find another job where you do two days so you’ve got a couple of jobs where you can experience both types of dentistry and learn from both. Find out what you are good at and what suits you and try to move into that other practice. You’re not going to go into a private job straight away where the practice provides very good dentistry if you don’t have a bit experience or you haven’t invested in yourself to do it. Like because why would the principal hire someone who doesn’t know how to put a rubber dam on, who doesn’t-

[Jaz]
Extractions is the first thing that comes to mind. I think as a young dentist to be able to confidently extract teeth is a fundamental thing a lot of people don’t, we talk about rubber dam and bonding and stuff but even more fundamental we should all be able to be good at our extractions.

[George]
Yeah exactly and to be honest I’m still not confident with extractions that’s why I’ve got an oral surgeon I’m like vj you just you deal with that baby that’s fine. Grade three perio I’ll take them out and then act like a hero after but that’s all.

[Jaz]
Well, that’s what people need to hear that right now George. That’s very humble of you and very good of you to say that because if you don’t want me to be saying is that people have this perception that George is amazing at everything which you are by the way. Okay, but it’s really good of you to put your in any ego side and just be very humble and say you know what extraction is not my forte and I think people just needed to hear that and that’s very good of you to say that. Because what you’ve also described in that same vein in that same sentence is that you’ve almost found your niche and then it’s okay that you’re not a master extractions because you have team members that you can refer to that are fantastic at that.


[George]
You’re a 100 percent right. And I think that you will find your position in dentistry where you can almost do what you like to do and you think you’re good at. If there’s something that you don’t then get someone else to do it and hopefully you can get into a practice where like for example I do the restorative now, the surgery I’ll leave that to bj. The perio I’ll leave that to the periodontist. Endo, I like a bit of endo but like simple endo. Look give me a kind of single tooth primary endo happy days I’m great with restoring that. If it’s a re-endo if it’s like I’m searching for the mb2 I can’t find it look that patient is probably better off in Aaron’s hand with the microscope downstairs so it’s, and I think that you can be completely up front with patients. Because I used to think that patient comes in and then I used to think that sugar I need to be the expert of everything now and give this patient everything that they need but actually I think they respect you all. Exactly but I think they respect you more to say look this isn’t how we do it here you know you need this endo I will admit that he is better at endo than me he will get a better result so you should see him and this and that and they I used to also expect when a patient comes in to be able to give them their treatment plan. And this complex treatment plan after that checkup first but and I used to put a lot of pressure to have to do that. But now I’ve accepted look I’m going to go away I’m going to get a scan I’m going to sit down with this I’m going to talk to some other people and we’re going to come up with a plan it might not go 100 to what we think it is going to be because I don’t know what’s under this big amount and I don’t know what’s under that crown but this is the preliminary plan it will probably change a little bit along the way. And patients understand when you have that up upfront conversation with them, they’re human we’re human obviously you get your high lead patients that are a bit hard at work. But again if you don’t feel that harmony with that patient sometimes maybe they are better off in in another conditions hands.

[Jaz]
Brilliant. Fantastic. I love the direction that this podcast got in already. So you told your journey and I think you shared that bit about how you got into the one day a week private. So we’ve covered that. We can get the DMs and stuff later because there’s so much. One I want to cover actually which I can you know I’ve got this valuable limited time with George The Dentist. I want to make it extremely valuable so first question, I know I didn’t email you this one I’m sorry it’s off the hip here I’m shooting from the hip so this is the question. Which is your case documentation like I like documents cases but with everything going on in life I really struggle especially with the pandemic and the hood I have to wear and stuff to be able to get into the rhythm of posting cases consistently so what’s your secret? And tell me this George, does George The Dentist have one of those meh kind of days where you just can’t be bothered to pick up the camera? Does that happen to you?

[George]
100% Jaz. And what I find with me is that if I see a case and I just basically tried to have everything accessible with me. So it’s easy to take those photos and I’m like look I’ve got a couple of online I’ve got a feeling I’m just going to take photos of this from start to finish. If I know that it’s a particularly tricky patient, if I know that it’s all going to be sub-gingival and bleeding the patient’s fidgety I’m like look man I’m just not going to do it and then what sometimes I’ll go be thinking look I haven’t got anything any nice cases that I want to talk or post about but then two weeks later I’ll be like I have got so much stuff on here that I want to talk to people about or put these pictures up and it kind of gets to the point that once you just make it that routine, if I went through my computer now I could find I could go through another you know knock down for four months and probably be posting like every day but I just don’t have the time now to actually do it and after a day’s work it actually people I don’t think realize that sometimes the whole social media thing can be a bit of a full-time job because you want to. I don’t edit the photos at all the only thing is that I do is like is crop it rotate maybe brighten right the flash hasn’t gone right. But actually thinking about something valuable to write for the reader cropping those photos putting them in a line you know it takes like half an hour I think.

[Jaz]
Big time.

[George]
So it’s actually in the evenings I don’t have time for that so sometimes I’ll be like that I’ll post every night sometimes it’s like geez actually I haven’t posted for a couple of weeks. But I do it because I enjoy it man and I actually this kind of pathway of the whole Instagram thing has made my dentistry a million times better. And that’s why I love it for. I haven’t gone into it initially I kind of went into it to get that Aaron my practice time was like look man you need to do an Instagram post and get patients through the door so it started to be directed towards the patient look before and after this is Invisalign whatever but actually what it’s turned into what I feel that I really like about it is that I’ve gone into more of the kind of dentist focus stuff because I like it. I mean I like the pictures of rubber dam I like the carriage removal I like the only preps. I think sometimes that puts off the patients but whatever I’m only doing it because I enjoy it and I think that maybe there is value. Maybe people I learn a lot from other people and maybe they could learn off me. I don’t know and so that’s the way that it’s gone but then what has actually happened is quite interesting is that it helps with reputation which is I’m very humbled to be the people come to me to for me to treat them and that kind of thing. But actually the funny thing is that I get a hell of a lot of patients that come in and they will travel quite far because they’re like look I can see that you actually want to do this like restorative treatment and fix teeth. So fix my holes I think this might need an on layer or a crown or whatever. So it’s they’re coming in for their general dentistry as well as just the kind of smile stuff which is cool because that’s what I enjoy doing.

[Jaz]
Brilliant and just a couple of reflections I want to share based on what you said there is I’ve said in the podcast before time and time again that when you start taking photos you actually go up a few levels in terms of how much you can improve in a short amount of time. But when you actually start posting and because you may now that you’re so experienced at doing it George you may not remember the first time you posted a case. I remember the first time I posted a case maybe 2013, 2014 I was crapping myself you know about oh my god other dentists going to see little micro steps so I thought sometimes we dissociate ourselves from that journey. But there’s so much to be gained from posting a co propulsion cases not only for your own improvement George, I’m sure you’ll agree but like you said you provide value to other people and it’s sharing it’s creating these conversations with other dentists so that we don’t feel isolated  excused upon in practice.

[George]
Yeah a hundred percent and that’s the thing before the whole social media thing you know I’d work my day a week whatever in this practice that I’m sitting in right now. I wouldn’t speak to another dentist. I couldn’t talk to them about the work that I’m doing because it’s not you can’t I don’t know if this is good or bad because no one’s seeing it and criticizing it and I’m not seeing what the level of care out there is. bBut you know once you start taking the photos of every single step of what you do you look at back at it you criticize it and you get a little bit better and you get a little bit better because you see actually I’ve made that mistake twice I’m going to improve on that. And that’s where you improve with your dentistry and this is where like say a fight. The other thing I think that say if you know we were talking about the dentist who has the different values to their principal right? If you want to find another practice that you want to work at that shares the same values document your work if I hire someone I want to see their work I don’t want to see the before and after. The lab have done a nice crowd great I want to see the process of your thought the step by step the access cavity the core in there I want to see the impression you know. And I think that if anyone wants to kind of get a step ahead maybe in the private sector take photos because that’s, I don’t even really read cvs to be honest with you. But I will look at the photos to see to see what they’re like.

[Jaz]
Which is why you hired [barrage] what a wonderful job he’s doing with his cases. Chip off the old blocking, if you’re his principal kind of, are you his principal right?

[George]
Yeah. So yeah and that’s where all of my associates have come from I’ve looked at their work we’ve shared the same values. And I think sometimes you don’t even expect an associate to come in to be absolutely perfect. But you will you grow together and learn.

[Jaz]
Brilliant. The little geeky question I want to ask is something that maybe doesn’t get discussed enough is what software’s are you using to manage your photos? Because I’ll be honest the system I use is very clunky like I put them on my mac and mac photos and what that does it creates a copy but then as soon as you rotate or crop it creates a duplicate copy. And then when you export it into a folder it creates a third copy so my hard drive is it’s got 70 gig worth of photos but that’s because there’s multiple duplicates. So I think it’s a clunky way. Are you doing the same? Or is there something better that you’re doing?

[George]
All I do so once I’ve taken the photos, I put the photos in my card reader which goes to my computer. I then email it this is and this is very clunky I then email it to myself so I just open it up on my phone all that I do on my iPhone is crop rotate and then put it on like the layout app by Instagram? So I put the layout on there and then post it. That’s all that I do.

[Jaz]
Okay good that gives people some ideas which is good to go by. Let’s get to the meat and potatoes of this episode. So we talked about your career pathway and story which is fantastic. Let’s talk about something very topical which I’d love to hear your views on is composite veneers obviously have really taken a trend the last six seven years I think. And the problem I have I’m just sharing with you I’m sharing with the dentists who listen and watch the podcast is sometimes I see beautiful teeth who perhaps all they need is a bit of whitening and edge bonding and then I see composite veneers and I really feel a little bit upset but then over time when I see such the quality of work and I see how happy the patients are and the fact that nothing was drilled away and then I’m thinking really is that as bad as it seems because the patients are ecstatic when they have that kind of treatment. So I’m really on the fence about it. I used to be very against it. Now I’m a little bit on the fence, where do you lie on this whole spectrum of when you sort of commit to doing composite veneers and that discussion that you have with patients?

[George]
I’m in the same campus that honestly I really don’t like full composite veneers that much and that I have done them and patients want them. But my real worry is just the long term of these teeth and unfortunately it’s got to the point where I’m getting patients that are coming to me that have these composite veneers on and they’re coming to me for me to cut them off. And those appointments where I’m cutting them off and it takes me longer to cut them off than it’s taken the time that they’d be put on in the first place and I’m feeling sick every single second of those appointments. I think geez this is not going to be fun and you cut them off. Unfortunately they will damage the tooth a bit. You’re always going to touch that tooth when you cut them off however careful you are and it might be a bit scratchy. They’re not a reversible treatment. As my career has gone on I do much more orthodontics now and I since I kind of started my ortho like sort of career about three or four years ago with Invisalign, I have so much more appreciation for occlusion and the teeth being in the right place so a composite veneer to patients we’ve all had it you get them coming in from Instagram being like I want composite veneers give me 10 up there. I want to go out the same day looking great and you’re like look there’s so much misalignment here. That tooth you just got to do a bit of cutting that too is going to end up with a composite veneer that thick. And unfortunately what’s going to happen that patient’s going to come back, they’re going to have perio issues. These things are going to stain they’re going to chip because the occlusion isn’t right and again you’re going to have to be the one that’s repairing that. So personally now I will, I kind of refuse to do that sort of treatment. You’ll get it done somewhere someone would do it. But a much more minimal elegant edge bond that maybe covers like a third of the tooth so you can get a little kind of knife edge in there personally is the way that I like to go and I think a lot of these patients need pre-restorative alignment first and I do not mind doing the bonding then. But I will say to a patient that comes to me typically it will be that they need some Invisalign or ortho a bit of bonding and I’ll say that as soon as you have this bonding though we are essentially, we are tied together for the rest of your life because I will bond these teeth but they will need maintenance. And typically I will tell the patient that every year you’re going to be in with me and we’re going to get you in for about an hour and I’m going to charge you an hour for a maintenance appointment where any chipping we repair we give it a bit of polish right? And then I will say in three to seven years we’re going to have to replace the whole lot are you happy with that? I will say when we put this on your teeth your maintenance is so important you may, I will have a patient that I will do and I will say look I have patients that I would do bonding on they will come back in three years’ time and it looks better than the day that I placed it because they look after it and they’re careful with it. However I will do the same bonding on a patient and they will come back chipping and the reason it’s the chipping is because they’re being careless with it. They’re tearing open crisp packets they’re doing weird things they’re holding their keys in their mouth whatever and it will chip so I just make sure I almost like to the kind of under promise over perform situation but I’m making sure that they know that this is this is going to need maintenance. And I don’t like to cover a whole tooth with composite or if it’s starting to go up to the gum margins or inter-proximally it’s got to be super, super, polished very thin but going towards the incisive edge you know maybe a cut a third of the buccal surface incisively and that’s kind of what I prefer to do but it needs to be maintained.

[Jaz]
Brilliant. I think you and I are cut from the same cloth my friend. But the most common positive feedback I get on the podcast is when a guest like yourself comes on or I will share something that is like a conversation that we have with the patient or something that we commonly say to patients or a part of the consent process. And I think you covered such a huge gem there that I’m going to implement straight away. I think I’m going to really copy you and model you whereby you say to the patient an hour of your time every year I think that’s great because it tells them up front that it really commits them to that  maintenance and it really makes them part of it makes them really appreciate it much more. It also covers your stress that you told them and then the bills of the practice are paid and then you can spend that hour you’re probably doing an examination as well as any polishing doing their health regime giving them hygiene recommendations yeah and that’s a great way to do it I want to tell you that so I think a lot of people will be thinking, wow that’s absolutely genius.

[George]
Yeah and the thing is Jaz that half the time they don’t actually need repairs right they don’t get chipping but you’ve put it in there in the first place and you are right they’re coming for their checkup so you can do their checkup do it and then give them a bit more whitening gel or whatever they’re wearing their hopefully their retainers if you’ve done a bit of ortho before so you can really you can really do it and the way that I kind of package these treatments now to patients is that when if you have treatment with me for your Invisalign and your bonding it’s coming with your hygiene appointment your thorough examination you’re getting viveira retainers with it so this is all about the maintenance long term because it’s too easy to go and be like yeah get this Invisalign done in three months we’ll whack some composite on see you later and then suddenly it’s not as comprehensive and I think the more you kind of start to know about ortho and occlusion the more particular you get about these cases and certainly now I’d be treating things differently to what you do in the beginning of your career.

[Jaz]
Excellent, brilliant. And now for the final part of the podcast sir because there’s so many things I could pick your brain on but I just wanted to give because you’re one of these people who just good at or annoyingly good at all this kind of work so you’re treating more and more dentists I want to just tell me how what’s that like because I create a few not many but I just find those the most stressful things ever and then we’ll talk a little bit about biomimetic dentistry because I know you’re passionate about that. So tell us about treating other dentists. How do you find that man?

[George]
Yes like it’s literally the thing is Jaz now it’s pretty much every day that I’m seeing a dentist like literally before we’re recording this I had a dentist that she come quite far and it really does make me I’m like look I thank you like so much for traveling this way yesterday I had another dentist so it’s most days you know but I used to find it at first particularly stressful because again they come in you work I know that you’re the same as me right and you put a hundred percent effort into every single restoration on every single patient but when it’s a dentist in the chair obviously you know that they know so you have to be so particular which would do anyway but and we all have days where things don’t go quite to plan but then after a while I got to the point where I was like look I’m just going to give you my absolute honest opinion I’m going to do the best that I can for you and I think they understand that and you have this whole conversation with it and it’s like they’re coming to you for a reason and so I just get used to it and now it’s just fine because I’m like look I’m going to put as much as I can into it if you like it you like it if you don’t you don’t and hopefully you do like it basically and they appreciate it they appreciate you you’re working hard.

[Jaz]
Have you had that dentist yet who triangulates your treatment i.e. they get one mirror in one hand another mirror in another hand and then and they’re doing this have you had that dentist yet?

[George]
I haven’t had that dentist yet but luckily I’ve got a screen above my thing so I’m just like the Netflix is a better thing to watch than my restoration here.

[Jaz]
Brilliant and let’s finally talk about a biomimetic dentistry. How did you get into it? What is your definition of biomimetic dentistry? I had I recorded with David Gerdolle recently I’m really excited to pump out this episode as well we called it extreme bonding how do you make this stick so that’s coming soon as well but I just want to hear what got you into it how would you define biomimetic dentistry because a lot of people still don’t know what that is so go from there my friend.

[George]
Oh that’s a good point man. I think it’s just almost building a tooth as nature intended and I see a tooth as you’ve got the roots you’ve got the pulp you’ve got your dentine you’ve got your enamel and this structure is bonded together in a way that is amazing at carrying stress through if you buy it on a tooth the differences of the hardness of these different parts of tooth just everything is together in a way that you can function on it for your whole life and I think that a lot of restorations that we place we don’t appreciate that and again dentistry has come a long way personally for me in the last five or ten years where I want to glue that tooth together well and as soon as you cut it down for a conventional crown or you’re putting a filling that isn’t bonded well in you’re screwing up that system so the stresses aren’t transmitted through the tooth how they should be so we want to provide a restoration for the patient that keeps that tooth functioning how it is and a lot of that comes into picking materials that are similar to the tooth and gluing them in well and it might be something like in the past I placed I went through a stage of placing quite a lot of zirconia because I was like it’s a really hard material put it at the back of the mouth it’ll be fine because it’s super strong and hard but you know I didn’t really appreciate the time that with that becomes the whole brittleness factor with that becomes the opposing tooth that you’re wearing down whereas now I’m actually much more favoring to kind of gluing on a bit of emax if you can get the moisture control and it’s like I think it’s kind of a bit of like it’s adhesive dentistry on speed.

[Jaz]
That’s by far the best definition of biomimetic dentistry, adhesive dentistry on speed, fantastic.

[George]
Wow, yeah what so basically what happened I was always getting more into my adhesive dentistry because that’s what I truly believe in surely gluing something in is so much better than not gluing something in and then during lockdown version one I was like actually maybe I need to know a bit more about this and kind of fill up some of my time so I started a clearer line of diploma and I started a biomimetic course and this course is by the [elements] over in America and it’s basically a course of reading hundreds of studies and getting proper nerdy with the science behind it and trying to interpret that so it’s a course that I don’t think is really going to make you money but it’s for the dentist who wants to provide the best possible care for their patient because you’re not going to come out of it doing a smile design you’re going to come out probably a slower dentist but a dentist that can sleep better at night knowing that you have put everything into that you can and when a feeling when a patient calls reception and they’re like look my feelings come out it’s a very nice feeling to be like that’s not one of mine knowing that because you wanted that feeling in so well so you know what I mean you have confidence.

[Jaz]
Excellent. I’m going to wrap up now with a quick fire round okay I’ve just come up with this now quick fire around for you George all right if tomorrow you had to come to work and for some reason you only had one piece of equipment that was available of all the things they use what piece of equipment would it be?

[George]
The mirror. Holding the mirror up in a patient’s mouth and talking to them about the problems that they have and how they can prevent these problems getting worse.

[Jaz]
Brilliant. IPR strips perforated or unperforated?

[George]
I use perforated IPR strips.

[Jaz]
Air abrasion 50 microns or 27 microns?

[George]
I use 27 and I’ve actually got the the aqua care kit so which is amazing so like down here I’ve got my laser and my aquacare and I just keep 27 in there.

[Jaz]
Well dude that that answers all the questions I had I think we covered lots of themes I know you’ll be swamped with and I’ll be swamped with lots of  because it was very, very, easy listen I can just really enjoy the time speaking with you. Tell me George any final sentiments anything find anything that you want to share with dentists?

[George]
Yeah look I think that the day and age the kind of age that we are living in now of the whole kind of social media thing I think it’s very easy for a younger more inexperienced dentist to see this outstanding work that some people are doing around the world and expecting that they have to be doing that work straight away and be expecting unfortunately as well seeing the other type of social media where people are flashing their Ferraris and diamond watches and thinking that I need to have that now I’m comparing myself to everyone else I think that it takes a hell of a lot of time and investment and self-reflection on getting to a point where you’re happy with your dentistry and you will probably never be happy with your dentistry I am never happy with my dentistry and I will just you just have to sign up to like CBD for life and doing courses and heavily investing with yourself and I think that if you do that and you surround yourself with dentists that have similar values to you I think that will come at a later stage and it’s a long career where you need to be enjoying what you actually do so surely to be proud of the work that you’re doing it’s going to help you sleep better at night so don’t feel the pressures of seeing this stuff criticize your own work to get better take photos of your own work constantly and try not to let it get to you will let it get to you it happens patients will come in and you will think what have I done wrong why is this patient not happy with me it happens to us all and I’m here if anyone wants to talk about anything like that you know.

[Jaz]
Amazing. George thank you so much for giving up your time I know you’re such a super busy guy we planned this a few months ago it is an honor to have you on the podcast  I’ll let you know when it’s out and honestly have a super day have a super weekend and really appreciate your time as always my friend.

[George]
Take it easy man see you soon.

Jaz’s Outro:
Guys how good was that episode how good was that little pearl about telling your patient before you placed the composites before you actually start treatment you tell them about their maintenance cost going forward so yes they’re having all this treatment done but what are they expecting to pay on an annual basis and what they’re getting for that in terms of an annual review a polish any minor chips repaired I just think that’s genius that’s like an insurance policy for your composite veneers it ensures that your patients come back to you and any issues are dealt with but it also ensures that the patient is not out of pocket because they budget from it from the start and you’re not out of pocket because you’re not repairing chips for free so it’s such a genius system and maybe I’m late to the party and I didn’t know this but I’m hoping for those who didn’t know this  got some value from that and in just a few weeks’ time by the way we’re doing the second launch of the online splint course  I’d love to have you on and if you’re interested do check out splintcourse.com register and I will email you when it’s ready and the final bit of news I have for you is that for those of you who are on the WhatsApp group it kind of got a little bit full I’m just reminding you that we now have a telegram group as well so we can stay in touch i think the dentist who messaged me saying that we want a group where we can just talk teeth right there are a lot of banter groups a lot of groups are memes but this is a group just to talk teeth yes you’re allowed to banter and stuff but it’s about getting clinical opinions sharing cases sharing tips and pearls with each other so join us on the telegram you can find that all on protrusive.co.uk and I’ll see you same time same place next week.