Paul Feuerstein, DMD

Back in February, the committee for the Cellerant Best of Class Technology Awards met for the 12th year at the Chicago Dental Society’s 155th Midwinter Meeting and voted on the Best of Class products of 2019 and a few that emerged in the first few months of 2020. As in past years, there were several products that were previous winners and a few new innovations that had not been seen in dentistry before. The committee members talk with manufacturers, scour dental meetings throughout the year, and sit through detailed presentations. Many of the products are evaluated in the members’ practices to provide a closer look at the claims made about these products as well as their advantages and disadvantages. The committee members also poll their colleagues who have seen or used these products to get more feedback and even scour online forums to try and get some feedback from the masses. This year was especially interesting as the Chicago meeting was the last in-person meeting of 2020. We normally follow up with further evaluation of the potential winners at meetings through May, which was not possible this year. However, it is interesting that many of the chosen products have been particularly relevant in our changing practices and protocols as our circumstances developed. This year’s winners include Weave, which provides more patient communication needs; the Shofu EyeSpecial camera, which can be disinfected; Mouthwatch’s TeleDent remote teledentistry solution; and exocad’s ChairsideCAD, addressing the more subtle issue of keeping your digital restoration design and lab work in-house, thereby eliminating the possibility of sending out potentially contaminated impressions while allowing you to create restorations in your own controlled environment.