DrBicuspid.com Business & Industry Insider

Dear Business & Industry Insider,

The era of dental CAD/CAM has finally arrived, according to two companies that offer digital impressioning products and services. And with the trend toward removing the per-click fees associated with digital impression scanners, the market is poised for the kind of growth many companies have long been dreaming of.

Read more about these and other exciting developments in dental CAD/CAM in our first Business & Industry Insider Exclusive.

In other business news, as part of a new strategy to grow its diagnostic and clinical product offerings, DentalEZ acquired all dental market rights to the Identafi 3000 Ultra oral cancer screening device from Trimira. Read more.

And despite assuring ClearCorrect two years ago that it had no intention of going after the company for patent infringement, Align Technology has filed two lawsuits against its clear-aligner competitor, charging both patent infringement and unlawful business practices.

Meanwhile, the ADA is challenging the findings of a Pew Center on the States report that claimed to demonstrate how dental practices can profit from adding midlevel providers to their team and improve access to care in the process. Read more.

The ADA is also disputing suggestions that the U.S. is facing a dentist shortage and that the only solution to the access-to-care crisis many Americans face is new workforce models. Click here to read more.

In regulatory news, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is urging manufacturers of denture adhesives to take a more proactive role in informing consumers about the risks of zinc poisoning posed by some denture adhesive products, following "numerous reports" of adverse events related to the use of these products. Read more.

The FDA has also ordered three manufacturers of temporomandibular joint implants to conduct postmarket studies to determine the length of time before the implants are removed or replaced. In an analysis of adverse event reports submitted between 2004 and 2010, the agency found a "substantial number" of patients had these implants replaced within three years or less because of "extreme pain."

Finally, the founders of Inven, a Kentucky start-up that boasts three recent college graduates as its management team, hope to make a splash in the dental market with an endodontic file that enables users to set and retain the working length of the file throughout treatment. Click here to read more about this unique device.