Kathy Davies uses a microscope for a closeup view of her work

Feature -- by Mark Sproxton

Standing alongside the dentist, Kathy Davies watches intently as the bridge she manufactured rests in a patient's mouth. Carefully crafted to fit and look just like the original teeth, the piece fits perfectly. The color and shading match exactly. The patient is happy, and so is the dentist.

"It's satisfying seeing the work you created," said Davies, a dental technician with 25 years experience. "If you work closely with dentists, they'll let you see the work going in the mouth." But before the dental appliances are fitted, hours of meticulous, fine, detailed work must be completed.

Working in a dental lab, technicians are given assignments on a daily, or weekly, basis to build crowns or bridges, orthotics such as retainers or mouth guards, dentures, or casts/partials. At a work station, sometimes equipped with a microscope to help view the smallest detail, the technician uses buffers, drills, waxing tools, molds, along with porcelain, wax, gold, metal, and a host of other tools and materials, to build the pieces required by dentists. Once the piece is shaped and symmetrical, some require coloring, staining and glazing, others have to be fired in a kiln-like cooker. In many respects, the manufacturing of the pieces is similar to the jewellery industry, Davies said.

"Having good eye-hand co-ordination, some artistic sense, good color vision, and a sense of symmetry and proportion helps," she added. "It's equally balanced between art and science. And when working through a microscope, it can be fiddly." The effort required to complete a piece correctly can be frustrating. "The down side," Davies explained, "is working in fine detail requires a lot of concentration and patience."

Those skills are nurtured during the training leading up to becoming a registered dental technician. After completing two years at NAIT -- the lone Alberta school offering a technician program -- two more years of practical work is required before writing a provincial certification exam. During the practical work, dental techs-in-training must complete a log book to ensure they have practical experience in all areas of the trade. Although a few years away, Davies said the industry may specialize the training further, allowing students to become certified in one, or more, of the four distinct categories.

A technicians work can be small and awkward

Even after certification is attained, the learning continues. Licensed dental technicians must complete at least six hours of continuing education a year to maintain their licence. Davies has seen many changes in the industry, and training, since she started 25 years ago in a career she came across by accident.

At 14, she needed repairs on her removable retainer so walked to the dental lab to have the required work completed. "I saw what they were doing and found it fascinating," Davies said. Once she completed high school, she phoned around inquiring how to get into the industry, and has never looked back. At the time, technicians could take five years of on-the-job training before becoming certified.

In addition to training/educational changes, Davies said the day-to-day work has also progressed. "Twenty-five years ago it was like a shop where the dentist told you what to do," she explained. "Now it's more a team effort." Sometimes a dentist, dental surgeon, periodontist and technician will have to work closely, and collaboratively, to complete required work. At other times, patients will go directly to a dental lab for shading, or adjustments, to their dental pieces. "There's a lot of communication with the dentists and the patients," Davies said.

Technicians typically work in a dental office as a private technician, in labs ranging in size from two to 80 people, or more, or they may move into sales of dental supplies. Unless working for themselves, most technicians will work Monday-to-Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.