I’m still recouping from Washington DC, Wow! What a beautiful place and it was so fun getting to meet so many hygienists that were so excited about new products! I wish we would have had more time in the exhibit hall, but it was an excellent meeting! We got to go on the dinner cruise and that was so fun! I was not doing the electric slide:) Many were though, I was trying not to get sea sick:( I did get to visit with Patti DiGangi, what an incredible lady, if you ever get a chance to listen to her presentation don’t miss it!! http://www.pdigangi.com/ She has tons of energy and its contagious!!
I wanted to say congrats to our i-Pod winner at RDH UOR- Raychene - Congratulations!!
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Wow! What a busy summer for us as I’m sure for most of us!
We just got back from the ADHA meeting in New Orleans and the Pacific Northwest Dental Conference in Seattle. What excellent meetings! This was our first time at the Washington meeting and we got a lot of WOW’s!! I almost lost my voice. Its so fun to meet so many new faces that are interested in updating their technology in their office. We had so many excited offices that have been looking for a solution to the two person perio charting issue. There are alot of dental offices going through the change (not the midlife one) from paper to computers right now and it is a struggle at first, but so nice after its done. Be patient:)
Dr. Lorne Lavine has alot of helpful hints for those offices going paperless on his site at www.thedigitaldentist.com. Also, Dr Larry Emmott at www.emmottontechnology.com has alot of good advice on going paperless. It may seem difficult in the transition, but looking back you will not understand how you could have done the paper office.
I’m looking forward to the RDH UOR meeting in Washington DC next week too! It’s always a fun one!! So, I’ll keep it short for now- enjoy your summer! It’s almost over!
I know its been a while since I’ve written, I’ll try & be better; but lately I’ve had a few bumps in the road! Right now I’m sitting on a gorgeous lake in the mountains of Idaho & I’m so thankful to be able to be here! Even if I don’t feel a jerk at the other end of my fishing pole its a great day! Its so nice to feel the sunshine & be with family and friends; considering last week I was in the critical care unit at the Mayo Clinic!
I went in for a fairly simple procedure on my heart & ended up with a life threatening complication. I’d had this procedure done a couple other times & it hadn’t taken care of it so my cardiologist sent me to the Mayo Clinic where I could be treated by the best of the best & the best equipment. I had VT (ventricular tachycardia) which meant that for no apparent reason my heart would race to sometimes 250 beats per minute & often for hours like that- very exhausting & scary! The Dr’s can treat it with radiofrequency ablation, where they run a line inside your heart & burn the bad areas causing this issue. After doing this procedure twice we fet like my issue was on the outside of my heart & there are only a couple Dr’s that do this, that’s why I was at the Mayo Clinic. What an incredible place, Rochester Minnesota! Presidents have been treated there, I was in great hands! To me it felt like the same procedure, injecting medications into my blood stream to stress my heart and that good ol burning sensation, I was wide awake & after 11 hours I was pooped! As I was falling asleep they woke me up to tell me that my blood test showed I was internally bleeding & they took me back into surgery. They could tell it was from the liver but couldn’t tell enough to fix it, they figured they hit an artery in my liver which was a risk going to the outside of the heart. So I had two days of blood transfusions & boy was I thankful for those people that took the time & effort to donate blood! On the 4th day they were going to take me back into surgery to try & stop the bleeding again as my abdomin had puffed out to about 8mo pregnant! That morning I had felt so many prayers & God & I had a long chat & so I asked the Dr’s to check my blood level again because I believed I’d clotted on my own & could possibly avoid going back in. Thankfully I had stopped & was on my way to recovery! So now- tons of red meat and green leafy vegis to get my blood up! Try getting red meat on the cardiac critical care unit:) I’m still weak; but getting back to normal and so thankful to be here! I was so excited to get back to the Dental R.A.T. and so thankful to have such an awesome staff to keep everything going! I really appreciated all the cards & thoughts & prayers from so many people- they work!!
We just got back from the California Meeting, Wow! That was a huge meeting, alot like the ADA, very nice! And beautiful weather! We had a lot of great contacts! It’s always so fun to see the Wow’s on everyone! There are alot of offices that have been looking for a solution to voice. Its nice to solve a problem for them. It was also fun to see different software companies and try the Dental R.A.T. with them. We ran Daisy Dental software http://www.daisydental.com/and Datacon Dental http://www.datacondental.com/ and the Dental R.A.T. worked perfect with them. We even ran a MAC software program with the R.A.T. and it worked great! They were excited to have another option besides voice. We already have been demonstrating the Dental R.A.T. with Dentrix www.dentrix.com and Eaglesoft www.eaglesoft.net and PracticeWorks www.kodakdental.com and Softdent www.kodakdental.com and the Florida Probes software only version www.floridaprobe.com , but it was fun to see it run others too! We found many offices had been hesitant to get computers in their hygiene operatories since they still needed a second staff member to enter the perio readings. But, now that they saw a way to run the computer without increasing the staff they were interested in getting computers in the back ops. Anyway, what an excellent meeting, I’m glad we went and we’re already planning next years trip to sunny California (hopefully with the kids:)
As more and more offices become computerized it all becomes a function of how to utilize the technology we currently have without increasing staff. It is a very expensive and time consuming project on the doctor’s end and it is frustrating for them if after that expense they still need to have additional staff members to run it all. That is how the Dental R.A.T. can pay for itself so fast as it saves that extra staff member.
In starting a new business and looking at all the expense and costs to start an office I’ve grown to really appreciate how you really need to utilize the staff that is there to be the most efficient. To do that often takes more effort on the existing staff members and often some change. I realize change is hard, but it can be fun! We should be able to embrace the change and not resist it and we will be more professional in our business and personal lives. We always think how much money the Dr’s make but if we can help to be a part of the solution we can gain more respect and value to his or her practice that usually will come back to us in some way. :)
As I write this I am just returning from Minnesota. I got the privilege to visit a couple colleges and demonstrate our Dental R.A.T. I got to visit University of Minnesota’s HUGE dental clinic www.umn.edu/ and we’ll be helping them get set up for computers and Dental R.A.T.s in their clinic! What a privilege! It is a gorgeous campus and the staff is so sweet! I also got to go to Normandale Community College http://www.normandale.edu/ and demonstrate to the faculty and students. It’s so fun to see these different colleges and see the excitement as they get what the Dental R.A.T. does! And I also got to go to the Mall of America http://www.mallofamerica.com/ ; which brings me to my patient family. I have a couple teenage girls that would’ve loved to have come with me but had to stay home.
My kids and my husband have been very supportive throughout this whole journey! I really need to thank them because as we’ve been going through this whole process I have not been able to spend the time with them that I had in the past. And, it seems that I’m the one getting all the publicity and write-ups and traveling and they stay home and man the fort (without a pool). My family and friends have been so incredible thoughout this whole process! They have been so supportive! They have all been so patient as the Dental R.A.T. seems to be the topic of conversation everywhere we go. And; in the process I hope they’ve learned a lot too!
I have gotten to see a lot of colleges in my journey; but of course the first one we set up Dental R.A.T.s in was my alma mater Idaho State University http://www.isu.edu/ ! I would love to see all of the hygiene and dental schools in the US be set up with computers and software and Dental R.A.T.s. I just think it helps the students if they are experienced with all the technology they are going to be faced with when they get out! So we are helping hygiene and dental schools to get set up with computers and software and Dental R.A.T.s! I’m happy to say, there are several on their way!!
Welcome to the Dental R.A.T.’s blog! As our website is progressing I am also and thought I’d start a blog. As a hygienist that is an inventor and has started a business I get a lot of questions and thought I’d try and write some thoughts down. I’ll try and be frequent about it.
As I’ve mentioned on the video I’ve been a hygienist for a long time now (almost 20 years!). I have loved the hygiene profession; especially the relationships you can build with your patients. I really feel that you can learn something from every person you meet. So I haven’t moved on because I didn’t like what I was doing, in fact I am still trying to stay in practice one day a week.
So why did I do this whole project? I actually have been blessed to work in a very high tech office for the last 10 years. I got to learn the computer systems and really learned to love that part of dentistry also. At first I will admit it was a change but I looked on it as a challenge to be a step better that I was yesterday. The computers were great, but it didn’t seem to reduce the staff that was needed to do charting. We would always have to call an assistant or front office person into our operatory to help us perio chart. It became a real hassle if they were busy, and yet I legally still needed to chart. I had tried voice recognition and the Florida Probe and couldn’t find the consistency that I wanted! It just seemed natural for us as hygienists to use our feet and that is what I kept thinking about. One day a patient happened to be in my chair and I was venting to him that I needed a process to be able to probe alone and he knew an engineer http://www.airtrack-electronics.com/ to help me and the patent attorney http://www.pedersenco.com/ to talk to and I was on my way.
Our family had saved up some money for a pool at our new house and after the attorney gave me a green light I came home and asked the kids if I could have the pool money. Then; the journey began!
