Working with Port Coquitlam practices.
Smaller and single-dentist practices have no colleague down the corridor to consult on a borderline case. For them the laboratory is often the nearest available technical opinion, and it is under-used in that role.
The laboratory as a second opinion
A technician who works on restorative cases every day has a specific and useful kind of knowledge: what a given preparation will support, how a material behaves in thin section, whether an implant angulation will permit screw retention, how an anterior match is likely to go against a highly characterized neighbour.
None of that replaces clinical judgement, and it is not meant to. It is information that helps a decision, and it is available for the cost of a phone call.
Advising on demanding cases is part of what a laboratory is for rather than an extra. The cases that go wrong are disproportionately the ones where the first contact was the arrival of the impression.
Call before preparing, not after impressing
The most valuable conversation happens before the tooth is touched, because that is when every option is still open. Once a preparation exists, the material choice is constrained by whatever clearance was created.
A three-minute call at the planning stage routinely prevents a remake. The same question asked after the record is taken frequently produces the answer that the patient needs to come back.
Questions worth asking early: will this preparation support the material I want, is there enough space for what I have planned, what would you do with this shade, and does this implant angulation allow the retention I intend.
A broad case mix with lower volume
A small practice sees the same variety of cases as a large one but sends fewer of each type. That means less opportunity to develop a rhythm on any particular category, and a longer interval between similar cases.
It also means calibration takes longer. A laboratory learns how a practice prepares, how tight it likes contacts and how much occlusal contact it wants at delivery from a run of cases, and a lower volume simply produces that run more slowly.
Deliberate feedback shortens it considerably. Commenting specifically on the first ten cases — contacts slightly tight, occlusion arriving high, contours fuller than I like — is worth months of silent adjustment at the chair.
Continuity matters more when there is one of you
In a solo practice there is no partner to cover an appointment that goes badly, and no colleague to absorb a rescheduled patient. An unscheduled remake appointment displaces something that was already booked and cannot be handed to anyone else.
That raises the value of anything that reduces surprise: complete prescriptions so nothing stops for a query, verified clearance before the record is taken, and a seat appointment booked against a confirmed date rather than an assumed one.
It also raises the value of being reachable. A laboratory that can get an answer from you within the hour will hold up a case for hours rather than days.
Keeping records that outlast memory
A single-clinician practice tends to carry its conventions in one person's head, which works until that person is away, unwell or eventually selling the practice.
Writing down the laboratory arrangements takes half an hour: preferred materials by situation, contact tightness, occlusal contact at delivery, contour preferences, and anything you consistently adjust.
It is useful immediately for whoever assembles cases at the practice, and it is genuinely valuable later — that accumulated calibration does not transfer automatically to an associate or a buyer.
Submitting cases
Digital scans and conventional impressions are both accepted, and cases move by UPS and Purolator. Fairmont works with practices throughout British Columbia and across Canada from the laboratory in Burnaby.
Prescription forms are available on the Rx forms page, or the laboratory can arrange printed pads for the practice.