Dr. Daniel Buser to Receive 2013 Nobel Biocare Brånemark Osseointegration Award
Dr. Daniel Buser, Professor and Chairman at the Department of Oral Surgery at the University of Bern in Switerzerland, becomes the sixth recipient of the Nobel Biocare Brånemark Osseointegration Award. The award is given annually by the Osseointegration Foundation to honor an individual whose impact on implant dentistry is exemplary in any or all of the Foundation's mission categories: research, education, and charitable causes.

OF President Dr. Jonathan H. Orenstein, Marlton, NJ, will present the award Saturday, March 9, at the end of the Academy's annual business meeting at the Tampa Convention Center.

Too Good to Learn?
By David L. Cochran, DDS, PhD
Are you ready to become a better implant dentist? Is it your goal to provide the best clinical care you can to your patients? It is hard to answer no to that question. But the real question imbedded in that is what are you doing to provide the best care you can? Do you think you are so good that you can't get better? Are you too important to do what it takes to improve your own skills or learn something that improves yourself?

As an academic dentist, I see students who come to school with a huge range of abilities, but much more important to them (undoubtedly without their knowing it) is that there is an equally large range in their openness to learn. That alone will likely impact what kind of student they will become and not their initial skill or knowledge entering their program.

Zombie Implants and the Potions We Use
By Dr. Bruce K. Barr, Academy News Editorial Consultant
It is believed by some the voodoo god Damballa protects humans from zombies, also known as the living dead. There is even a U.S. software protection company that took the name of this deity, but it is apparent to many dentists his powers do not protect us from the increase in zombie implants. Those undead, cyclically infected, swollen, purulent, painful structures that some, with only a few terminal threads left in bone, mystically stay solid, supporting extensive prosthetics our patients do not want to and often cannot afford to lose.

These implants, defined by the unofficial zombie index of small, medium, and large (bone loss less then 20%, 50%, and more than 50% respectively) that refuse to heal or die, we try to bring back to health with a vast array of potions and surgical techniques. This article seeks to explore techniques used by our collective membership. Currently, the two most common views expressed by experienced clinicians seem to be the importance of decontaminating the implant surface, and then, many said only half in jest, to pray.