{ from the editor } by Douglas Wyckoff, DDS • Editor


Let Your Imagination Roll I


want you to put on your imagination glasses for a few minutes and look through them without jumping to conclusions right off the bat. I want you to put yourself in the position of the dentists experiencing these scenarios I describe. OK … take a deep breath, sit back and relax as I take you on our imagination tour.


In the first scene you find yourself newer in dental practice. You have built up your patient base and have become quite busy providing dental treatment to the point you are having to schedule out patients not just a few weeks, but a month or two. You evalu- ate what procedures you have been doing and either you or your dental hygienist have been spending a tremendous amount of time providing preventive dental care to many healthy patients who have reversible inflam- mation (the more non-complicated recare patients). This much needed treatment is taking a major amount of time out of either or both of your schedules, to the point that neither of you are able to spend time doing the more tedious, complicated treatment for those patients who need it. You have been looking for either your first dental hygienist or another one to add and are finding there just aren’t enough available in the workforce to fill the position. At this point if you’re letting your imagination run with this, you should be feeling uneasy, maybe even a little nervous about what comes next in this prac- tice. How long will you have to wait to find someone to help with providing treatment in your office so you or your current dental hy- gienist have time to tackle the more difficult procedures you were trained to do?


It is now time to move to our next scenario so take another deep breath, exhale slowly and relax. Erase the stressful feelings you just had and clear your mind. Now we will put on the imagination glasses again and experience another setting.


6 focus | SUMMER 2023 | ISSUE 2


You now find yourself a seasoned practi- tioner. You have built a strong patient base and a very supportive team around you that includes business personnel, assistants (OJT, certified and EFDAs) and at least one dental hygienist. Your business has expanded greatly since the early days in practice, and you re- cently either remodeled your office to expand or you changed locations so you could add to your treatment facility. You have had to add a chair or two because the demand for you and other providers in your office has increased greatly. You have done all you can to push you and the other providers to beyond what time will allow. You realize that you and the others can be only one person and only be in so many places at once. You have hired and had your existing team members gain additional training as Expanded Function Dental Assistants (EFDAs) to help provide safe dental treatment to your patients. In do- ing so, you have been able to provide dental treatment to more of your patients because this has allowed you more time with other patients requiring your expertise. You have also built a strong preventive care system in your office for your patients. You are finding your hygienists are spending a tremendous amount of time providing preventive care


to many healthy patients who have healthy medical histories and very little periodontal issues. Many of your other patients have been diagnosed with periodontal issues that require more complicated procedures, mostly scaling and root planing, but there isn’t any time in the schedule for the hygienists to do it for three months.


Again, in this setting, you decide you need additional help but have had ads in every place possible for more than a year and can- not find a dental hygienist to hire to help alleviate the patient load in your practice. Patients are having to delay scheduling ap- pointments because you and your hygiene department just don’t have time in the schedule to get them in any sooner.


Ok, we are going to stop here with the imagi- nation glasses. I am sure you are feeling the stress because you are not able to provide the basic needs for many of your patients. Your current hygienists are working the best and most efficiently they can, but they too can only be in one place at a time. In both imagi- nation offices, the dentists have worked hard to make sure the preventive side of practice is well established, but they are having a dif- ficult time keeping up with the needs of their


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32