Quan from Auckland — single Neodent implant for a cracked molar

Real patient story, shared with permission. This patient has consented to Picasso Dental Clinic publishing their experience to help other New Zealand patients. Treatment, material, NZD price, and timeline are accurate to the case archive. Reviewed by Dr. Tran Thanh Phong, Head of Implantology.

Quan is in his late thirties, a software developer in Auckland. He cracked a lower molar biting down on a frozen energy bar at his desk, somewhere in the middle of a two-week sprint. He kept working — told himself it was a chipped filling, dosed it with painkillers, and shipped the release on time. Three days after the retrospective, a sharp jolt while drinking cold water made the decision for him. The tooth had split vertically and no amount of standups was going to fix it.

His previous dentist confirmed the crack ran below the gumline and the molar could not be saved. It was extracted, leaving a gap in the lower arch he could feel with his tongue all day. An Auckland private clinic quoted him NZD 6,500 for a single implant with a crown. He already had family in Hanoi and visited every couple of years, so before he committed he sent us his records. We returned a written, itemised NZD quote within 24 hours: 1 Neodent implant with crown at NZD 2,000 per tooth = NZD 2,000.

The brand and the bone

Quan is the kind of person who reads the documentation before he commits, so his first questions were about the system and the bone, not the price. We explained that Neodent is a titanium implant system from the Straumann Group — widely used, well documented, and carrying a 5-year clinical warranty on the implant crown through our clinic. We sent the manufacturer information ahead of his arrival.

His other worry was whether he had enough bone in the lower jaw or whether he would need a graft that dragged the timeline out. We could not finalise that from photos alone — a CBCT scan on arrival was needed to confirm bone volume. We were upfront that if a graft were required the plan would change. As it turned out, it was not.

The two trips

Trip 1 — placement (4 days)

Healing window

Quan flew back to Auckland and his standups. We let the implant integrate over the following months and sent a remote check-in along the way. The gap was the only reminder it was happening.

Trip 2 — crown (3 days)

What it cost end-to-end

Pricing is in New Zealand dollars at 1 NZD = 15,000 VND (May 2026).

On the treatment alone Quan paid NZD 2,000 against the Auckland range of NZD 6,000 to 7,000 — a clinical saving of NZD 4,000 to 5,000. Even after two return flights and a week of accommodation, his all-in total of around NZD 5,800 still came in under the Auckland implant quote on its own. Because he stayed with family and timed both visits around trips he was half-planning anyway, the travel barely registered against the saving.

The thing he didn’t expect

From his survey: “I’d blocked out a week of sick leave expecting to be wiped out after the placement. I was back on my laptop the next afternoon with nothing stronger than the over-the-counter stuff I already had in my bag. The recovery I’d braced for never arrived. The hard part was remembering not to chew on that side, not the surgery.”

What aftercare looked like back in Auckland

Quan had a routine check with his own Auckland dentist a few weeks after the crown was fitted. We sent a written aftercare summary and the implant record — Neodent brand, batch, and components placed — so his dentist could add the implant to his file and pick up the history at any future check. His 6-month review came back clean, and the evening jaw ache from chewing on one side had gone.

Quan’s three pieces of advice

1. “Don’t ship through tooth pain. I told myself I’d deal with it after the release, and a chip turned into a split tooth I couldn’t save. Get the scan before you finish the sprint, not after.”
2. “Read up on the system, not just the price. Knowing it was a Neodent implant from the Straumann Group with a 5-year warranty made the lower price feel like a saving, not a shortcut.”
3. “Build the trip around real life. I had family in Hanoi and visits I was half-planning anyway, so two trips slotted in without burning extra leave. Stack the dental work onto something you’d do regardless and the logistics get easy.”

See also

• Single-tooth implant treatment page — the protocol, brands, and NZD pricing.
• Implant aftercare — what Quan was told for home maintenance.
• Auckland to Vietnam dental implants page — local benchmark and route logistics.

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About this page

Medically reviewed by

Dr. Tran Thanh Phong

Head of Implantology, Picasso Dental Clinic

DDS · 25+ years in practice · 15,000+ implants placed · 1,000+ All-on-4 cases

Clinical focus: Implantology · All-on-4 · Zygomatic implants

Dr. Tran Thanh Phong has practised since 2001 and leads implantology across the Picasso group. He was the first Vietnamese dentist to perform All-on-4 immediate loading (2010), placed over 15,000 implants across his career at roughly 600 per year, and has completed 400+ zygomatic implant cases since 2017. Loma Linda University-trained (2010). Clinical representative for Nobel Biocare in Vietnam since 2007.

Last clinically reviewed

28 May 2026

Published by

Picasso Dental Clinic

Review policy

Every medical procedure page on this site is reviewed by a named Picasso clinician before publication and re-checked when pricing, materials, or protocols change. Source documents are linked at the bottom of each page.