Thursday, April 4, 2013
Last century, BC (before computer) when you took all your radiographs with film and developed them with an automatic chemical processor hidden in a dark room, how many processors and dark rooms did you have?
The answer of course is one.
But how did you manage with two hygienists and a dentist all taking radiographs?
Didn’t you need a dark room and processor for each of them?
That is not a serious question, yet it is exactly the attitude some dentists take when it comes to digital radiography sensors. They believe they need a corded sensor for each room or for each person taking radiographs.
This seems to make sense because a sensor is a film substitute. If you had film in each room you must need a sensor in each room.
However, a corded sensor is not just a film substitute it is a processor substitute as well. Think of it as a reusable film that processes an x-ray in four seconds and then can be used again. If you could run your office with one dark room and one automatic film processor, you can run it with one corded sensor.
This is important because the sensor is the most expensive part of the system. A typical sensor will retail for approximately $8,000. Many dentists are still holding back on going with digital radiography because of the cost. They have the mistaken idea that they will need three, four or even more sensors. That makes the cost of going digital $30,000 or more. In fact, with one $8,000 sensor plus connections and software adding another $4,000, the total cost should be no more than 12,000.
Keep in mind a darkroom and automatic film processor will cost at least $12,000.
Most of the radiographs we take in the dental office are taken in hygiene. The time to take re-call x-rays with a corded sensor (no developing, mounting etc.) is less than four minutes. If you have three hygienists and all three hygiene patients need re-call x-rays, there is plenty of time to move the corded sensor to each room during the 45 to 60 min appointment. One sensor can easily serve three or four hygienists, just like one dark room and film processor can serve three or four hygienists.
The time to take four digital bitewings with a corded sensor is far less than the time required to expose the films, run to the dark room, unwrap and insert the films (hoping the machine won’t eat them), then run back, label a mount, mount the films and run back to the treatment room. Yet we expect multiple hygienists to do all that, sharing the dark room during the re-call appointments.
Dentists take radiographs on endo and emergencies. There will be many days when the dentist never takes an x-ray. When the dentist needs the sensor, just go and get it. It may be in use, but the wait will only be a few minutes. In fact it is less likely to be in use than the old auto processor, and the wait will be shorter.
The idea that you need multiple sensors is just not true. If you are among the 40% or so of U.S. dentists still looking to go with a digital x-ray system or you are looking to upgrade an older system, save yourself some big bucks and start off with one sensor. If you find I am wrong and it just isn’t working, as a last resort…they will sell you another one.
The future is coming and it will be amazing!