Can I get a dental crown in one day in Rockhampton?

Yes. A same-day CEREC crown at A2ZDental in Rockhampton is $2,500, and it is designed, milled and fitted in a single visit. Your tooth is captured on a CEREC Primescan intraoral scanner in about two minutes — no impression putty — and the crown is cut from a solid ceramic disc on the CEREC Primemill in this building while you wait. You leave with the finished crown bonded in place.

The usual pathway elsewhere is two appointments a fortnight apart with a temporary crown in between. That matters more the further you have driven.

Pricing is indicative. Diagnostics inform final pricing — you receive a written quote before anything begins.

What a same-day crown is

A crown is a ceramic cap that covers a tooth which has broken, cracked, worn down, or been weakened by a large filling or root canal treatment.

A same-day crown is the same restoration made by a different process. Instead of taking a physical impression, posting it to a dental laboratory, fitting a temporary and waiting a fortnight, the tooth is scanned digitally, the crown is designed on screen and milled on site, and it goes in at the same appointment.

Same tooth, same ceramic, one visit instead of two.

What CEREC is, and what we actually run

CEREC stands for Chairside Economical Restoration of Esthetic Ceramics. It is the CAD/CAM system — computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing — that makes a crown in the practice instead of sending it to a laboratory.

Plenty of practices say “CEREC”. Fewer say which units they have, so here are ours:

• CEREC Primescan. The intraoral scanner. A small camera builds a three-dimensional model of your tooth in about two minutes. Nothing to bite into, nothing to gag on, no impression putty. It is Dentsply Sirona’s current flagship scanner and it is one of four intraoral scanners in this practice.
• CEREC software and exocad. The crown is designed against a scan of your opposing teeth, so it meets them the way the tooth it replaces did. We run exocad alongside the CEREC software, which gives more control on the cases that need it.
• CEREC Primemill. The milling unit. A diamond bur cuts your crown from a solid ceramic disc, in this building, while you wait.

All three are on site at 36 Macaree Street, Berserker. No laboratory, no courier, no fortnight in a temporary.

It is worth asking any practice offering same-day crowns which scanner and which mill they have, and whether the milling happens in their building. That is what determines whether you actually walk out with the tooth finished.

How a same-day crown appointment works

1. Prepare the tooth The tooth is numbed and shaped so the crown has something to sit on. Any decay or failing filling comes out at this point. About 30 minutes.
2. Digital scan The CEREC Primescan captures the prepared tooth, the teeth either side, and how you bite together. Around two minutes. No impression putty.
3. Design The crown is designed on screen in the CEREC software against your own bite. About ten minutes. You can watch it happen — most people do.
4. Mill The design goes to the CEREC Primemill and a diamond bur cuts the crown from a solid disc of ceramic. Around fifteen minutes.
5. Fit and bond The crown is tried in, adjusted, checked against your bite and bonded. You leave with it in your mouth.

Total chair time is usually around two hours, including the wait while the crown mills. Bring something to read.

What the crown is made of

Solid ceramic. For most back teeth that means zirconia — a 1100 MPa disc, chosen because back teeth carry the bite and strength matters more there than anything else.

Where appearance is the priority, usually on teeth that show, lithium disilicate (e.max) is often the better choice. It is more translucent and matches natural enamel more convincingly.

Which one suits your tooth depends on where it sits and what it has to do. That is decided at the appointment, not in advance.

Do same-day crowns look natural?

Yes. The ceramic is shade-matched to the teeth either side before milling, and the crown is designed against your own bite rather than an average one.

Front teeth are harder than back teeth. Matching a single central incisor to its neighbour is one of the more demanding things in dentistry, and it depends on the translucency and characterisation of the tooth beside it. Where a case is genuinely difficult, a laboratory-made crown with a technician’s hand in it can still be the better answer. We will tell you if yours is one of those.

Are they as strong as laboratory crowns?

Yes. The zirconia and lithium disilicate milled on the CEREC Primemill are the same materials a laboratory uses. The difference is where the milling happens, not what is being milled.

How long a crown lasts depends far more on what is underneath it and how you use it — how much natural tooth is left, whether the gum is healthy, and whether you grind. A crown on a heavily broken-down tooth in someone who grinds at night has a different outlook from one on a sound tooth in someone who does not, whoever made it.

If you grind, a splint protects the crown, and that conversation belongs at the same appointment.

What it costs

A same-day crown is $2,500. That includes the preparation, the scan, the design, the milling, the ceramic and the fitting.

What it does not include is anything the tooth needs before it can take a crown — root canal treatment, a core build-up, or gum treatment. Those are separate and are quoted separately, in writing, before anything starts.

You will know the total before you agree to it. There is no situation where you find out at the end.

Pricing is indicative. Diagnostics inform final pricing — you receive a written quote before anything begins.

If you are travelling in

One visit instead of two is a convenience if you live in Rockhampton. If you have driven from Emerald, Moranbah, Longreach or Blackall it is the difference between one trip and two, a fortnight apart, with a temporary crown in between that can come loose while you are four hours away.

Tell us where you are travelling from when you book. We will allow a longer slot and, where possible, combine the crown with anything else on your plan so the trip does one job properly. More on travelling in for treatment.

Questions people ask