It’s never been a more exciting time to be a general practitioner, as a growing number of dental practices expand the services they offer to their patients. According to American Dental Association (ADA) research, approximately 70% to 90% of general dentists perform at least some endodontic procedures in their practices.1 While general practices have traditionally referred more challenging cases to specialists, that too is starting to change. Many general practices now offer patients a range of services inside their operatories, including clear aligners, treatments for gum disease, simple implant replacement, select root canal procedures, and more.
That’s great news for patients and practices alike. As general practices provide more complex procedures in-house, they’re opening new opportunities for growth and revenue while saving patients the inconvenience of scheduling multiple appointments with different specialists. Win, win. To successfully expand their services, however, general practices must have the right technology, tools, and team in place. They must also have a high level of confidence in the accuracy of their diagnoses, the precision of the procedures they perform, and the predictability of outcomes that support a positive patient experience.
An innovator in digital imaging technology, DEXIS is committed to developing solutions that empower confidence for dentists and their teams. With three exciting new launches — ORTHOPANTOMOGRAPHTM OP 3DTM EX, updates in the DEXIS Intraoral Scanner ScanFlow software, and surgical guide creation in DTX StudioTM Clinic — DEXIS supports a high level of confidence for general practices seeking to grow their business, unlock new possibilities, and expand the way they provide patient care.
If your practice growth strategy includes expanding your offerings, these three new DEXIS releases are a great place to start.
Diagnostic Confidence Driven by the OP 3D EX
Built on proven OP 3D technology, the OP 3D EX multimodal imaging platform provides general practices an entry point to expanded possibilities. With the OP 3D EX, you’ll find many of the popular features available with the OP 3D LX, including fast scan times, flexible applications, consistent high-clarity images, access to AI-enabled features embedded within the DTX Studio Clinic software, and patient comfort.
Let’s start with flexibility. The OP 3D EX enables you to capture detailed 3D X-ray images with adjustable field-of-view sizes using cone beam technology as well as various panoramic images adapting to varying patient anatomy and clinical needs. You also have the choice to use the ORTHOfocusTM feature to automatically identify the optimal panoramic image layer, or the multilayer pan that returns five panoramic layers within one exposure.
Along with flexibility, the OP 3D EX delivers the image quality you ‘ve come to expect from DEXIS. Because OP 3D EX integrates with DTX Studio Clinic, you’ll have access to filters within the software including Implant Contrast Enhancer (ICE), Edge Preserving Noise Reduction Filter (EPNR), and the enhanced Metal Artifact Reduction (MAR) that promote clean, crisp images for clinical confidence. Like the OP 3D LX, the OP 3D EX also features the reengineered head support design for comfortable patient positioning and stabilization that support consistent images on the first scan.
Like all DEXIS solutions, the OP 3D EX integrates seamlessly with award-winning DTX Studio Clinic software. This allows you to take advantage of the software’s embedded AI-powered features such as SmartFusionTM that automatically combines CBCT and intraoral scan data for 3D views of underlying anatomy; SmartFocus that enables tooth-by-tooth navigation; and MagicAssist that automatically sets up images for instant viewing and diagnosis. Additional smart features include DEXIS Connect Pro proactive monitoring service with remote connectivity and troubleshooting that support optimized uptime and productivity — an advantage for busy general practices.
With customizable Field of View (FOV) options, the OP 3D EX meets a wide range of dental demands for general practices. Featuring adjustable FOVs up to 10×15, the OP 3D EX can be used to scan and capture images that focus on a region of interest as well as complete dentition for more comprehensive views.
A solid investment for general practices, the OP 3D EX provides the image clarity, access to AI-enabled software features, and flexibility that support improved workflow efficiency and enhanced diagnostic confidence.
IS ScanFlow Supports Patient Case Acceptance
Used in combination with the OP 3D EX, intraoral scanning plays an equally important role in general practices seeking to expand their services. DEXIS intraoral scanners are equipped with DEXIS IS ScanFlow software to simplify and streamline how you leverage intraoral scans to communicate findings with your patients. The latest release of IS ScanFlow introduces Oral Compare that helps clinicians and patients visualize changes in dentition over time.
With the latest IS ScanFlow update, your team can quickly capture full arch scans then overlay the scans for a more complete picture of your patients’ oral anatomy. The software then creates a color map that clearly illustrates changes in the patient’s mouth — such as gum recession, uneven bites, and wear and tear from grinding — that have occurred over time. Using the DEXIS IS Voyager trolley, you can share these scans with patients right at the chair to point out the changes both on the screen and inside their mouths.
The IS ScanFlow with Oral Compare provides a powerful patient engagement tool, allowing you to easily show patients specific areas of concern that may need to be closely monitored. While providing proactive care, you can also leverage images in IS ScanFlow to help patients understand what’s happening within their mouths and boost treatment acceptance. When it comes to time to recommend treatments and procedures, your patients may be more willing to accept and comply with your recommendations given the visual evidence.
Confident Outcomes with Intuitive Surgical Guides with DTX Studio Clinic
Along with increased diagnostic and patient confidence, general practices seeking to broaden their offerings must also be confident in the procedures they perform and the predictability of outcomes for patients. The latest version of DTX Studio Clinic software supports this procedural confidence with the addition of an intuitive surgical guide creation feature.
DTX Studio Clinic now allows you to design surgical guides directly in the software in under three minutes. Easy-to-use surgical template functionality enables you to generate chairside printable high-resolution surgical template with just a few clicks.
Surgical templates in DTX Studio Clinic also enable adding inspection windows for seating verifications as well as labels for identification after production. Expert settings allow further adjustments, including creation of an implant rotation marker. Once you click finish, your high-res surgical guide is ready for 3D printing either at an outside lab or on your inhouse 3D printer — allowing you once again to keep this service inhouse.
In addition to the surgical guide, the system produces helpful support documents including Surgical Instructions and Assembly Instructions. Your surgical template is stored in DTX Studio Clinic in a single patient file along with all other patient images and attachments, accessible from any workstation in your practice and ready to be exported in STL format whenever needed.
With DTX Studio Clinic and its embedded AI-enabled MagicAssist, you can now virtually extract the tooth (or multiple teeth) in cases where extraction is recommended, and generate a photorealistic 3D virtual tooth setup to engage the patient with the proposed treatment. The same virtual tooth setup then can be used for implant planning crown-down with the final prosthetics in mind, including planning and visualizations of considered abutments.*
With the newly added DTX Studio Clinic surgical template feature, the possibilities for general practices are now wide open!
Growth Begins with Confidence
General practices that offer their patients a wider range of services and care, including more complex procedures, can strongly differentiate themselves as well as attract and retain more patients. Expanding services and complexity, however, requires no small amount of confidence on the part of the practice and the entire clinical team.
DEXIS is ready to support your general practice in your continued business growth by evolving solutions to enhance confidence in your diagnoses, procedures, and predictable outcomes, while enabling your patients to remain confident in your team. Speak to your Patterson representative to learn more about DEXIS solutions.
- “Recent Trends in the Market for Endodontics.” Burns, Lorel, D.D.S.; Vujicic, Marko, Ph.D.; Blatz, Andrew. Health Policy Institute. American Dental Association.
*Subject to supported implant product libraries.
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