Many family dentists and pediatric dentists employ a dental laboratory to fabricate their space maintainers. This is a completely satisfactory approach, assuming the dental laboratory is able to follow your instructions appropriately and produces appliances of good quality.

It is even possible to have the laboratory come into the picture at various stages during the space management process. For example, you could send the laboratory the compound impression. One of the major advantages of compound impression material is that it is stable. It does not undergo distortion before the pouring process. In this way, the laboratory will do the pouring and the appliance construction.

You could also send the cast to the laboratory and they can construct the appliance using the cast that you have poured.

Whether you use a laboratory or make the appliance yourself is a matter of personal preference. We have included instructions regarding how we construct appliances for those of you who will be involved in appliance construction.

We will continue with the fixed unilateral space maintainer as our instructional example of appliance construction.