LMT Magazine Archive

The LMT staff was proud to celebrate our 40th annual LAB DAY Chicago last weekend. What began in 1985 with 30 Exhibitors and less than 300 attendees is now the largest dental laboratory show in the world! This year, we had 296 Exhibitors and 4,786 attendees from 50 states plus DC and PR and 58 other...

In Part 2 of LMT’s State of the Industry coverage, the results of our 2025 Subcontracting Survey illustrate how technology trends and the evolving needs of laboratories are fueling the growth of this long-standing practice.

For the last four decades, LMT has conducted its State of the Industry Survey every five years, offering an in-depth look at what’s trending and what’s changed in the marketplace. And—with the COVID-19 pandemic—these last five years have been a tumultuous ride, creating unprecedented...

Mark Bultmann, MDT, offers a step-by-step look at fabricating a hybrid abutment crown using NexxZr T Multi from Sagemax.

Julie Woolf, Argen COO, details how she and her team implemented Lean to sreamline processes, eliminate waste, reduce labor costs and improve products.

Express Dental Laboratory's new 12,000-square-foot-facility in Norman, OK, offers the team ample space for growth; see inside the new lab.

Operating a dental practice had always been in the back of Lab Owner Nick Oganov’s mind. After all, he had been a practicing dentist in the former Soviet Union before arriving in the U.S. as a refugee along with his wife and son, George, and finding work as a dental technician. He opened his own...

Let’s drill into the numbers to discover the trends and challenges prevalent in the dentist community, using statistics from the ADA’s Health Policy Institute.

From dealing with DSOs and recruiting technicians to increasing sales and managing growth, laboratory owners and managers have a lot on their minds in 2025. Here are strategies for managing some of the challenges:

Forty-nine percent of LMT's State of the Industry Survey respondents plan on retiring in the next five years. If you're one of them, here are some key considerations.

Ortho lab operators share how technology has impacted their business, the current state of workloads and their future outlook for this niche.

They say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas; well, I’m going to spill a few beans about the NADL’s Vision 21 event which took place in Vegas last month. As always, it was an excellent meeting. About 300 people attended and 50 of them were first timers; if Vision 21 isn’t on your radar,...

General Managers Jamie Bartley and Robert Ratliff renovated a 100-year-old building into a stunning 19,000-square-foot laboratory that blends historic charm with modern features.

Todd Fong shares tips to help you maximize the success of your 3D-printed appliances and ensure patient safety.

In late September, Helene, a Category 4 hurricane, hit a number of states along the East Coast. Asheville, NC, home to Image Dental Arts, was especially devastated. “It was like a tornado of 15 feet of water had filled the entire first floor of the lab which houses all of our offices, porcelain...

The patient had one implant placed in the restorative space for teeth #25 and #26. Even though his other teeth were not completely uniform in color, the esthetic expectation was fairly high and he didn’t want a noticeable difference in shade. The doctor requested a one-piece, screw-retained...

One of my top accounts had an edentulous patient with a unique request: complete implant-retained dentures with no palate and every tooth made out of a silver-colored alloy to “match his personality.” I have been a technician since 1970 and this was a first for me; challenge accepted.

The...

The patient had an eight-unit PFM bridge on teeth #21-28 and complained about bulky incisal edges and chipped ceramics. Due to a medical issue, implants weren’t an option so we went with a removable solution: a milled titanium substructure with bi-lateral ball attachments and monolithic zirconia...

This year, our laboratory was privileged to work on an exceptionally unique and challenging case. It stands out as our favorite due to its complexity and the profound impact it had on the life of the patient: a 45-year-old male who suffered severe dental trauma in an accident.

He had lost several teeth...

~ Sean Chun, Owner, JC Dental Arts Studio, Carlsbad, CA

This was a challenging but interesting single central implant case. The patient injured tooth #9 while playing sports as a child; eventually it fell out and he was missing a tooth for several years. My dentist-client, Dr. David Geen, and I...

Not every laboratory gets to fabricate restorations for some of the biggest names in the NFL, but American Dental Designs (ADD) has been quarterbacking cases since 2021 when its client, Dudhat Dental Group, was named the official dental office of the Philadelphia Eagles.

“Since Dudhat needed a...