Dental Lab Questions & Answers
Q: 1. How do I find out if my lab is outsourcing my work to another lab?
A: First of all you can call them up and ask them directly. If you don't get a satisfactory answer, then you have to conduct the investigation yourself.
Before that a little background information: The dental lab outsource business has evolved over the last 30 years from a single lab in California that outsources to Philippine to many multinational conglomerates. At the top there are dental manufacturers such as Dentsply International, Den-Mat etc. The middle ones are the nationally advertised labs such as Continental Dental Lab, Trident Dental Lab, Pacific Edge Dental Lab, DDS lab, Crown Dr. Dental Lab, Smith Sterling Dental Lab etc. The next ones are your local dental labs; they may do part of the work in house and out source the rest. The last ones are repackaging and forwarding companies that receive and forward your lab cases.
To find out whether a lab outsource or not, first check out their web site. There are tell tales signs you can look for:
1) the lab has two turn around time such as 5 days and 10 days.
2) the lab has a calender for you to check turn around time.
3) the lab has 2 price systems for most of their procedures such as one regular price and one premium price.
4) the price for a PFM-NP crown under $50.
5) the name of the lab has "USA", "America", "global ", "world", "international" in it.
6) emphasis they have certified lab technicians that answer your phone calls promptly.
7) emphasis they are FDA approved with a FDA license number.
8) emphasis they are ISO 9001 certified.
9) emphasis they use dental materials from Germany or US etc.
10) emphasis they are 100% made in USA.
Another way to check is to Google the name of the lab owner and the address of the lab. Sometimes you find the lab owner lives in a mail box or the address of the lab is a residential house with a picture of the house from Google map. This is alright if it is a one man lab working out of his house but not a nationally advertised lab.
The third way is to check employment or career opportunity from their web site. If the employment position opening is only for persons with good communication skill and dental lab knowledge but not certified dental lab technicians that means they are only looking for people to answer the phone and not to do the lab work.
Finally you can call a local dentist that practices near the lab and ask him about the lab. I am sure you can get a lot of information that way.
Q: 2. Some labs emphasis their work are made 100% made in USA does it means they are not outsource labs?
A: Not necessary, some of them may lie to you. You may test them by sending them some cases. Look for the tell tales sign that are mentioned at Q:1. Some may emphasis 5 days turn around but when you send them a case they call and say it will take 10 days. That means if you push them they will do it in house for 5 days for a higher fee but the rest they will outsource. Sometimes you can tell the 5 days and 10 days lab cases have some difference in the way the dies are prepared or the models are labelled. You know they are from two different labs.
Q: 3.Does dental lab outsourcing takes away American job?
A: For every dental crown that is outsourced to another country there is one less crown to be made by American technician. On the other hand, without dental lab outsourcing the fee charged by the American dental labs would be much higher. Imagine if US does not allow automobile import, we will be driving cars that costs much higher thanks to the labor unions and at a poorer quality. We all enjoy a higher standard of living thanks to companies like Wal-mart, Target etc. that provide us with good quality merchandise imported from other countries at a lower price.
Q: 4. Does your lab's prosthesis contain lead or any other substances that are harmful to patient's health?
A: All the materials we use are FDA approved and does not contain harmful substance. In addition, every case comes back from our lab will have a material label included. Please check our Product & Material section for detail. On the other hand, the only way you can be sure about the material content of a dental prosthesis is to sent the prosthesis to a third party independent analytical lab to have it analyzed. We will occasionally send our dental prosthesis out to be analyzed to make sure the material is the same as it is labelled.
A: First of all you can call them up and ask them directly. If you don't get a satisfactory answer, then you have to conduct the investigation yourself.
Before that a little background information: The dental lab outsource business has evolved over the last 30 years from a single lab in California that outsources to Philippine to many multinational conglomerates. At the top there are dental manufacturers such as Dentsply International, Den-Mat etc. The middle ones are the nationally advertised labs such as Continental Dental Lab, Trident Dental Lab, Pacific Edge Dental Lab, DDS lab, Crown Dr. Dental Lab, Smith Sterling Dental Lab etc. The next ones are your local dental labs; they may do part of the work in house and out source the rest. The last ones are repackaging and forwarding companies that receive and forward your lab cases.
To find out whether a lab outsource or not, first check out their web site. There are tell tales signs you can look for:
1) the lab has two turn around time such as 5 days and 10 days.
2) the lab has a calender for you to check turn around time.
3) the lab has 2 price systems for most of their procedures such as one regular price and one premium price.
4) the price for a PFM-NP crown under $50.
5) the name of the lab has "USA", "America", "global ", "world", "international" in it.
6) emphasis they have certified lab technicians that answer your phone calls promptly.
7) emphasis they are FDA approved with a FDA license number.
8) emphasis they are ISO 9001 certified.
9) emphasis they use dental materials from Germany or US etc.
10) emphasis they are 100% made in USA.
Another way to check is to Google the name of the lab owner and the address of the lab. Sometimes you find the lab owner lives in a mail box or the address of the lab is a residential house with a picture of the house from Google map. This is alright if it is a one man lab working out of his house but not a nationally advertised lab.
The third way is to check employment or career opportunity from their web site. If the employment position opening is only for persons with good communication skill and dental lab knowledge but not certified dental lab technicians that means they are only looking for people to answer the phone and not to do the lab work.
Finally you can call a local dentist that practices near the lab and ask him about the lab. I am sure you can get a lot of information that way.
Q: 2. Some labs emphasis their work are made 100% made in USA does it means they are not outsource labs?
A: Not necessary, some of them may lie to you. You may test them by sending them some cases. Look for the tell tales sign that are mentioned at Q:1. Some may emphasis 5 days turn around but when you send them a case they call and say it will take 10 days. That means if you push them they will do it in house for 5 days for a higher fee but the rest they will outsource. Sometimes you can tell the 5 days and 10 days lab cases have some difference in the way the dies are prepared or the models are labelled. You know they are from two different labs.
Q: 3.Does dental lab outsourcing takes away American job?
A: For every dental crown that is outsourced to another country there is one less crown to be made by American technician. On the other hand, without dental lab outsourcing the fee charged by the American dental labs would be much higher. Imagine if US does not allow automobile import, we will be driving cars that costs much higher thanks to the labor unions and at a poorer quality. We all enjoy a higher standard of living thanks to companies like Wal-mart, Target etc. that provide us with good quality merchandise imported from other countries at a lower price.
Q: 4. Does your lab's prosthesis contain lead or any other substances that are harmful to patient's health?
A: All the materials we use are FDA approved and does not contain harmful substance. In addition, every case comes back from our lab will have a material label included. Please check our Product & Material section for detail. On the other hand, the only way you can be sure about the material content of a dental prosthesis is to sent the prosthesis to a third party independent analytical lab to have it analyzed. We will occasionally send our dental prosthesis out to be analyzed to make sure the material is the same as it is labelled.
