The Dawson Academy

Charlotte, NC

The North Carolina Mini-Residency

The Dawson Academy Core Curriculum is a post graduate mini-residency in solving even the most complex dental problems involving esthetics, occlusal problems, TMJ issues, and advanced restorative care. The principles learned can be applied to everyday dentistry or advanced dental cases.

Our mini-residency provides a customized continuing education path for dental practitioners interested in obtaining advanced knowledge and mastering skills necessary to providing complete dental care. The mini-residency provides hands-on clinical learning experiences, one-on-one instruction, and group discussion using a variety of modalities.

How the North Carolina Mini-Residency works

An exclusive group of 20-30 dentists and/or lab technicians will study and complete the Dawson Academy Core Curriculum over a 12 month period.

The curriculum consists of seven courses: two lectures completed online, four hands-on courses completed at the Dentsply Sirona Academy in Charlotte, NC and a final lecture completed in Clearwater Beach, Florida.

The four hands-on courses will be taught by a Senior Faculty at The Dawson Academy. They will be available throughout the 12 month period (and beyond) to support the members in implementation and clinical success.

Why Mini-Residencies work

The professional relationships mini-residencies build can result in a network, which extends beyond the classroom, and can significantly help students’ practice growth and fulfillment.

Course Dates and Information

Apr. 04-05, 2025
Charlotte, NC
$2,495.00
Embark on the first course in your transformative journey with Occlusion & Smile Design. Elevate your dentistry to the top 10% as you explore occlusal stability, patient communication, case acceptance, and practice management, all underpinned by timeless principles for harmonious and predictable restorative care. Experience the fusion of function and aesthetics, analog and digital workflows, and ignite your practice’s efficiency and fulfillment in ways that reshape your approach to dentistry. This course can be taken in person, or online.

Description

Core 1 in the first course of Dawson’s Core Curriculum. Over two days, you’ll learn the requirements for occlusal stability to improve your practice–from examination and records to treatment planning to practice management.

Added material in this occlusion-led course includes patient communication, case acceptance, converting to a fee-for-service model, and more.

These timeless principles remain the foundation of quality care dentistry. True long-term success, otherwise known as predictability, in restorative care is the merger of esthetic, functional, and phonetic parameters. The foundation of The Dawson Academy is rooted in a complete understanding of how the TM joints, muscles, proprioceptive input, lower anterior teeth, upper anterior teeth, lower posterior teeth, and upper posterior teeth are designed to function in harmony with one another.

Examples will be presented for both analog and digital workflows–with bonus content catered to implementation and business management. Students will understand how integrity and fulfillment are intertwined to create the most efficient and predictable outcomes and results. This course will give you an insight and understanding that will change not only how you practice and manage, but your enjoyment of practice as well.

Learning Objectives

  • Visualize the journey from an insurance-focused level of care to a patient-focused, health-oriented model
  • Discover why the most productive practices only need 10-12 new patients per month
  • Convert the dental practice to fee-for-service with ease and predictability
  • Motivate patients towards a higher level of health to ethically boost productivity per hour
  • Identify the 11 factors critical to a stable occlusion resulting in the long-term success of general and cosmetic cases
  • Gain confidence in diagnosing TMD-related issues and how to provide appropriate, successful orthotic/splint therapy
  • Understand the treatment planning relationship between the face, airway, and bite and how to identify, prior to treatment, which patients pose a risk of future instability
  • Eliminate porcelain chips and breakage, and uncover how these issues can erode profitability more than dentists realize
  • Determine tooth positioning for orthodontics, veneers, crowns, or implant-supported restorations
  • Utilize checklists for functional-esthetic analysis and treatment planning
  • Define a thorough examination process and how to implement in practice by employing diagnostic records for complete diagnosis and treatment planning
  • Recognize how designing a stable, minimal-stress occlusion on teeth or implants saves time, increases profitability, and reduces stress

Schedule & CE

Seminar Hours: 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. EDT

Tuition: $1995 – $2,495

CE Credits: 16

CE Codes: #180(4L), #490(2L), #550(2L), #730(7L) and #780(1L)

Speaker: Dr. Leonard Hess, Clinical Director

Target Audience: General Dentists, Specialists, Lab Technicians

Recommended Prerequisites: None

Meet the Instructor

Leonard A. Hess, DDS is the Clinical Director at The Dawson Academy and joined the faculty in 2009. He owns Union County Center for Comprehensive Dentistry in Charlotte, North Carolina, and practices full-time in addition to teaching continuing education courses. He is a member of the editorial board for Inside Dentistry and has had over 17 articles published in peer-reviewed journals. He is also a member of the American Academy of Restorative Dentistry, AACD, ADA, AES, and NCDS. Dr. Hess began teaching continuing education courses in 2005 on topics including occlusion, smile design, treatment planning, preparation design, and practice integration of Complete Care Dentistry. He’s taught full-day continuing education courses at the American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry’s national meeting, The Greater New York Dental Meeting, AACD National Meeting, Pacific Dental Conference, Ontario Dental Association meeting, and The Yankee Dental Conference. Dr. Hess has taught courses in Japan, Germany, Poland, China, and Canada.

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Benefits of the Mini-Residency Program

Increase practice revenue
Increase your practice revenue by tackling cases you currently are not confident enough to treat; many doctors say they recoup the cost of the training on their very first case!
Eliminate re-makes and case failures
Eliminate re-makes and case failures by adding predictability to all of your restorative procedures. From a simple composite to a full mouth reconstruction and implants, The Dawson Academy’s principles of occlusion and treatment planning will forever change how you examine your patients and deliver care.
Increase efficiency, profitability and predictability
Increase efficiency, profitability and predictability during the examination, treatment planning, case planning and lab communication process by utilizing The Dawson Academy’s treatment planning software.
Grow together
Grow together by sharing experiences about implementing the material into your practice and encouraging each other between classes. From these experiences, you’ll form strong bonds amongst yourselves, which continue post-curriculum plus enjoy access to the Resident Study Club.

What other Dawson cohort attendees have said…

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For Dawson Scholars Graduates

The Dawson Academy is an ADA CERP Recognized Provider.

ADA CERP is a service of the American Dental Association to assist dental professionals in identifying quality providers of continuing dental education. ADA CERP does not approve or endorse individual courses or instructors, nor does it imply acceptance of credit hours by boards of dentistry.

Concerns or complaints about a CE provider may be directed to the provider or to the Commission for Continuing Education Provider Recognition at ADA.org/CERP.

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