It's been over two and a half years since the COVID-19 pandemic first broke out. Recurrent pandemics, climate change, wars, and economic downturns, the world is becoming more complex than ever, and not a single individual can be immune to the aftershock. The pandemic continues to have a major impact on every industry, especially the healthcare industry. Among health professionals, dentists are exposed to a higher risk of being infected due to close contact with patients. Routine treatments have been affected during the pandemic period, dentists have to reduce the number of patients per day and the time they spend in the dental office.
While the pandemic seems to get stable and better now, the number of patient visits still remains low. People are afraid of getting infected while visiting their dentists, as saliva is a potential source of infection. Therefore, it's crucial for dentists to implement the highest infection control standards, but also need to reassure those anxious patients.
From the perspective of both patients and clinicians, the implementation of a digital workflow with an intraoral scanner (such as Launca DL-206 Intraoral Scanner) will make the post-covid 19 environment far less challenging and will play a major role in accelerating practice recovery. A reason for this is the digital workflow is more hygienic & comfortable and it facilitates better communication with patients and partner labs.
Patient's Preference for Digital practice
Now more than ever, people need extra information, guidance, and support to navigate a novel set of challenges. They want a service they can trust and make them feel safe when everything seems uncertain. The pandemic has accelerated the implementation of digital workflows, and patients have come to expect the latest technology to be a standard aspect of their care. In fact, it is become the key differentiator in choosing a dental practice, because a digital practice involves less physical contact, and dental clinicians can create a more "touch-free" patient experience.
Higher Risk with Traditional Impressions
Working with a traditional impression-taking workflow may pose various risks to both clinical staff and technicians in dental offices, as analog impressions can be contaminated with saliva and blood, increasing the likelihood of oral pathogen transmission.This potential for contamination also extends to the production of restorative models, and the time taken to transport them to the dental lab may further increase these contaminants. Simply put, the more contact points that exist during the process of making impressions and restorations, the higher the risk of contamination and infection transmission.
Improved Practice Efficiency Through Digitalization
Compared to conventional processes, digital workflows help dental professionals to mitigate cross-contamination issues related to traditional impressions. More importantly, digital impressions offer patients greater comfort, more efficient to perform and deliver, and involve the need for fewer impression remakes than traditional impressions. As every workflow is digital, it eliminates the use of trays, chewing waxes, and impression materials, and also cut the contamination chain who deliver to the labs. With digital scan, there’s no need for shipping and handling, the infection risk is just limited to the direct contact in the dental office with the patient and contamination can be prevented by the use of PPE, surface disinfection and sterilization of the intraoral scanner tips. Therefore, a digital workflow is always a better choice to be implemented during the post-COVID-19 to limit infection risk in restorations.
Make the Transition and Stay Competitive
The pandemic has led to increasing competition between dental practices due to the decline in patient numbers, and whoever can provide quality patient care will be the preferred choice. Rather than settling for the status quo, dental practices should consider keeping up with the latest technology to make the treatment experience for patients as comfortable and convenient as possible. With tens of thousands of dental practices and labs adopting digital workflows, now is the perfect time to make the transition to digital dentistry and grow your business.
Learn more about Launca intraoral scanners and request a demo today at launcadental.com/contact-us
Post time: Jul-29-2022
