Dr. Kunal Lal, BDS, MS, DDS

Dr. Kunal Lal is a prosthodontist in Midtown East Manhattan and a Diplomate of the American Board of Prosthodontics, certified in 2006.

A prosthodontist is a dental specialist in the replacement and reconstruction of teeth, recognised by the American Dental Association and requiring three additional years of training after dental school. Board certification is a further step beyond the specialty itself: it is examined in four parts, and Dr. Lal completed his over four years between 2002 and 2006.

Columbia

Dr. Lal earned both his master’s degree in prosthodontics and his DDS at Columbia University College of Dental Medicine, and then stayed to teach. He was Assistant Professor of Clinical Dentistry in the Division of Prosthodontics from 2002 to 2010, and served as Program Director of Graduate Prosthodontics from 2005 to 2008, running the programme that trains the next generation of specialists.

In that role he supervised twelve graduate residents in clinic four days a week, oversaw the curriculum, and was responsible for every resident’s master’s thesis. Across the division he worked with a team of more than twenty dentists.

He was recognised with Columbia’s Teaching Appreciation Award in 2004 and its Resident Achievement Award in 2002.

Implant reconstruction

Dr. Lal’s clinical and academic focus is the treatment of patients missing some or all of their teeth, using dental implants to rebuild a full, fixed bite.

He has published on the use of computer-generated surgical templates for planning and placing implants, and lectures nationally on computer-guided implant surgery combined with immediate loading protocols. The practical effect of that approach for a patient is a shorter, more predictable treatment: the position of every implant is planned in software against the final restoration before any surgery happens, rather than being judged during it.

His presentations include the Dentsply Sirona Lab Summit in Charlotte and the Greater New York Dental Meeting, and he took first prize for table clinic presentations at both the national and New York section meetings of the American College of Prosthodontists in 2001.

Teaching, still

Dr. Lal founded and runs the Digital Dentistry Forum, a study club and continuing-education group for dentists working with digital workflows, which holds master classes in digital prosthodontics in New York.

For patients, the reason that matters is simple. The techniques used in this practice are the ones he teaches other dentists.