5 minutes with Dr Nick Fahey…

15th June 2022

6 minute read

We speak to Dr Nick Fahey about the advancements in implant dentistry and his desire to enhance protocols and educate with BioHorizons Camlog.

You’ve been placing implants for quite some time. Can you briefly tell us about your background and how you got into implants?

Originally from New Zealand I came to the UK in 1997, initially working for the NHS. I lasted only two weeks! Luckily, I got a job at 1 Devonshire Place, just off Harley Street, as a maternity locum which led to a permanent position. It was here that I became exposed to an array of straightforward and complex treatments, something which spurred me on to invest my time into training and expanding my clinical expertise. And so, I enrolled at the Eastman to obtain my Prosthodontic degree, where I was exposed to many different types of implant systems.

After many years working in Devonshire Place and Harley Street, I now work solely in Woodborough House Dental Practice, my referral practice in Pangbourne, West Berkshire. Here, I am the lead clinician in a team with significant experience in the multidisciplinary approach to patient treatment and care, accepting referrals related to prosthodontics and implant dentistry.

How have the demands and acceptance of implants changed, and how will this affect the next generation of implant clinicians?

In the early days, there was a lot more tolerance to implants and the miracle was ‘integration’ – patients were just happy to have a replacement tooth. Today, as things have evolved, standards are so much higher and there is potential litigation to contend with. The implant needs to look invisible in the arch and a higher level of attainment is needed right from the start. To those starting out in implants today – you need to get your learning curve up quick sharp!

Essentially, I don’t want anyone to go through what I went through when I started out. I’m conscious of those who are just starting that they don’t have the luxury of what I had when I started. Clinicians today are expected to place implants like someone who has had years of experience and it is nave to think that you will achieve that unless you take measures to help you.

Over the past 30 years, I have worked on thousands of cases and have gained plenty of implant experience and thus now have a strong desire to impart my knowledge onto the next generation of implant clinicians.

How does partnering with BioHorizons Camlog support you in this goal?

In the past twenty years, I’ve become very interested in guided surgery and leaning more towards education and sharing my expertise. It was hard for some implant providers to accept some of the changes I wanted to their system. Essentially, I wanted to align with an implant provider which was nimbler with guided surgery and willing to take on board some input with a clinician like myself who has spent more than 20 years in the field. After all, an engineer placing an implant on a benchtop doesn’t mean it is going to work in someone’s mouth. My collaboration with BioHorizons Camlog means that we can evolve the guided surgery with Camlog to help to make it seamless.

Fundamentally, if you’re teaching clinicians how to do something, you want everything to be structured like a recipe that they can follow and simply just works without hindrance. BioHorizons Camlog are more adaptable in their approach to guided surgery, with a strong desire to help push it forward in both educational importance as well as enhance their systems and protocols too. They’re adept at accepting any problems and are keen to partner with industry professionals to establish ways to make improvements. That’s a winner in my book – as my aim is to ‘fix things and not use workarounds’.

With your many years of placing implants, why is the BioHorizons Camlog CONELOG PROGRESSIVE-LINE implant quickly becoming one of your favourite implants?

I simply love the geometry of the BioHorizons Camlog CONELOG PROGRESSIVE-LINE implant and the great primary stability this implant achieves. I think the flutes on the side of the drill profile are fantastic. There are also keyless guides which mean you don’t have to use an accessory handle like some guides, so it is user-friendly. I like the conical connection and the implant surface is very good and clean. With German precision and a self-locking connection, it enables you to have precise positioning of the abutments. Quite simply, it’s got a lot going for it, especially if you only want to use one implant system!

Where can we expect to see you sharing your insight and expertise in 2022?

I’ve recently (Feb 2022) completed a webinar with BioHorizons Camlog and dentistry.co.uk on ’Predictable guided immediate implant placement in the aesthetic zone’. This webinar gives a whistle stop tour of the essential parts of guided surgery, including case selection, virtual planning workflows, and how to achieve predictability.

I recently returned from speaking about guided surgery at the Oral Reconstruction Foundation’s International Symposium in Orlando in the ‘Global Insights in Implant Dentistry: A Focus on Multi-disciplinary Treatment’ session.

Plus, I’ll be speaking at the BioHorizons Camlog UK & Ireland Symposium – Implants for life; a patient-centric approach to dental implantology in September 2022. A must-attend event, here I will be chairing the ‘Treatment planning protocols for lifelong implants’ session where there will be an honest debate around implants. We need to openly talk about things when they go wrong and what happens when you don’t achieve the desired result. This event will allow us to talk more in detail about guided surgery and the role it plays in treatment planning and predictability.

Last, but not least, I’m delighted to announce that my first book titled ‘Guided Surgery – Making Implant Placement Simpler’ will be launched and available to buy in late Summer 2022. Not intended to be an ordinary academic textbook, this book covers all aspects of guided surgery and in particular, my journey and philosophy when it comes to using guided surgery to make implant placement simpler. The cases presented in the book, illustrate scenarios that every dentist sees, in everyday practice, whilst offering a contrarian view that guided surgery should now be considered the new practice standard for oral implantology. The picture shown perfectly captures that ‘first copy in your hands’ feeling – watch this space for the official release date!

Thank you for your time Nick and we look forward to talking more with you in the future!