Introducing a Product Without Testing it First

By Jim Glidewell, CDT, Glidewell Laboratories, headquartered in Newport Beach, CA

One of the most serious mistakes I’ve made, among many, was introducing a new restorative service without personally testing the product before launch. I’m speaking specifically about Artglass^® composite resin, which was introduced to the market in the late 1990s. The manufacturer said the material could be used to create metal-supported restorations via a bonding protocol that required the Kevloc^® bonding system—but it turned out it didn’t perform as advertised. 

After we had started using Artglass and the Kevloc bonding protocol at Glidewell Laboratories, we began to experience a staggering number of delaminations. My suspicion was the failures were due to the bonding agent—a fact I confirmed...