The ‘No-Brainer’ Choice for Digital Impressions

Board-certified prosthodontist Miles Cone, DMD, has approached his dental career from just about every angle. During his military service, he learned to do his own lab work—an experience that inspired him to become a certified dental technician. Today, in addition to seeing patients at his practice, Nuance Dental Specialists in Yarmouth, ME, he regularly speaks, teaches, and writes about all things prosthetic dentistry. No surprise, then, that when it comes to taking dental impressions, he values both efficiency and accuracy.

“What I love about dentistry is the art side of it—making things,” he said. “But I just could not imagine not having an intraoral scanner. The digital workflow is the workhorse now. It takes care of the brute-force labor that I don't need to do.”

Why TRIOS?

Dr. Cone’s digital dentistry journey started with his first 3Shape TRIOS scanner in January 2023. He credits his wife and practice manager, Cornelia, with the decision to make the leap. “She was watching me work late nights in the lab, missing out on family activities, and she thought, ‘There’s got to be an easier way,’” he recalled.

When she organized a demo day to let him try several top-of-the-line intraoral scanners, the TRIOS immediately stood out.

“There were two critical things,” he noted. “One was the user interface. I’m not tech savvy. But the TRIOS just made sense. It was intuitive and clean.”

The other was 3Shape’s customer service. “It was phenomenal,” he said. “I could get somebody on the phone right away. And they do free peer-to-peer training in an intensive 2-day course at a skill level that’s appropriate for you.”

“I felt like I had a safety net. 3Shape was a no-brainer.”

Since then, he hasn’t looked back. “I couldn't imagine doing this the other way now,” he said. “We can treat so many more people now, but it's not a shortcut. We're really doing it at full value, full volume, and my cases now are much better than they were. We have much more focus and energy to put toward the little things that really matter. I put my fingerprint on the design at the very end with the details of the incisal edge and the tweaks that make it more human. That's been absolutely fantastic.”

All-Around Benefits

Dr. Cone’s patients think it’s fantastic too. “Patients don’t want to wait,” he shared. “We move efficiently and we do the things that need to get done, and we don't let patients sit there. We strike while the iron is hot and we move a case. That factor distinguishes us from other practices in the area.”

The scanner also facilitates better clinical coordination. “There's this triangular collaborative ecosystem we're working in now,” Dr. Cone explained. “It's myself, the ceramist, and the surgeon, and then the patient is at the heart of that—and it's better for them. It's not just better for my bottom line. It really does make a tremendous difference. The scanner has made the lab workflow happen in near real-time, where as soon as the scan is done, my ceramist has it—the case is there.”

“There's also the intangible value of your reputation—getting things back on time and done precisely, rather than trying something in and it doesn’t fit because the model was distorted when I poured the stone, or the silicone warped from the heat on the way to the lab,” he added.

After they started using the TRIOS, Cornelia calculated the value of Dr. Cone's time previously spent making and mailing alginate impressions and asked him how long he thought it would take to pay the new scanner off. “I guessed maybe a year, 14 months,” he recalled. She said, “In 2 and a half months with the number of patients we've seen, we paid it off on Friday.”

Today, he sees the return on investment as too great to measure, with factors such as case acceptance driven by the use of 3D images vs stone models during treatment conversations. “It's difficult to put a price on the ROI, but it's worth its weight in gold for sure,” he said.

A Long-Term Relationship

Dr. Cone is enthusiastic about his future using TRIOS scanners, noting the company’s commitment to ongoing innovation. At this year's International Dental Show in Cologne, Germany, 3Shape unveiled its most transformative intraoral scanner yet, the TRIOS 6.

TRIOS 6 is equipped with the world’s first-ever hyperspectral imaging technology, an innovation that simultaneously captures data from 3 light sources—white, fluorescent, and near-infrared—then fuses this data together into 1 image, effectively opening a window beyond the surface of the tooth. TRIOS 6 is a revolution in digital scanning, capturing lifelike HD scans with up to 110% higher scan resolution.* It also leverages 3Shape's patented ScanAssist technology, which uses intelligent alignment and haptic feedback for an effortless scanning experience.

“3Shape’s new scanner, the TRIOS 6, has just come out,” Dr. Cone added. “I know that’s going to revolutionize the way things happen. It's a very exciting time being in dentistry.”