Read post in:
Going on a three-day fieldtrip, XO CARE’s Chief Designer, Kim Sørensen, met with Dr. Reusch in Germany, where the two frontrunners in dental ergonomics had a lot to discuss. For years, both have committed themselves to better the ways of working in dentistry while improving dental practitioners’ health, treatment quality, efficiency, and clinic finances.
Dr. Reusch is operating a dental practice with outstanding high standards. In fact, many of the practice’s patients are dentists themselves. Besides his dental practice, he is also deeply involved in work to increase productivity and he is on an ongoing pursuit to stress the importance of protecting dental practitioners’ health.
When Kim Sørensen visited Dr. Reusch at his dental practice in Westerburg, Germany, dental ergonomics and productivity enhancements were – of course – main topics for the three-day visit that included both observations of practice work and in-depth conversation with Dr. Reusch and his team.
When Kim Sørensen visited Dr. Reusch at his dental practice in Westerburg, Germany, dental ergonomics and productivity enhancements were – of course – main topics for the three-day visit that included both observations of practice work and in-depth conversation with Dr. Reusch and his team.
“Dr. Reusch has been a friend for 25 years, and it was great to meet again and discuss dental ergonomics and practice management.
Dentistry is precision work, and many dentists could profit from adapting new working methods that allow healthy working postures and at the same time improve their financial performance,”
Kim says and continues, “I was very eager to participate in the hands-on ergonomy training and learn more about working with trays and tubs as well as discussing how dentists can program the treatments.”
Material management and instrument organization system
Dr. Reusch has developed a system that mitigates the issues of contamination caused by storing instruments and materials in the treatment room and the time loss that many dentists experience when an instrument or material is not present at the treatment.
“Usually, dentists keep instruments and materials in drawers, and when they need them, they turn to the drawer to reach for them and then turn back to the patient. One problem is that sterilized instruments and materials easily become contaminated when the drawers are opened.”
“Another problem occurs when the drawers do not contain what is needed, and the operators thus must go and search for them in the sterilization or in other treatment rooms. Thereby wasting time and maybe also disturbing other personnel. That’s why it’s a bad idea to keep instruments in the treatment room,” Kim says
The new system makes it possible for dental practitioners to store materials and instruments in tubs and trays instead. Each tub contains materials – and each tray contains instruments for a specific treatment. Before a treatment starts, the assistant has prepared the treatment rooms incl. the tubs and trays necessary for the treatment to be done. This hugely improves the practice’s productivity.
“The approach is very efficient and in line with the Lean philosophy, and it also makes it possible to down-size the treatment room size as will not have to function as a “warehouse”. Kim explains. Using this type of organizing instruments and materials, the practitioners have the required instruments and materials at hand near the patient and avoid unnecessary contamination.
The benefits are potentially massive.
According to Dr. Reusch, it is possible to improve the clinic economy with EUR 126.000 per employee every year due to optimization of sterilization procedures, material management, waiting time during treatments, savings on material costs and in the pre- and post-preparation procedures.
Improved workflows
The second topic that the two ergonomics experts discussed was how dental practices can improve their workflows. Dr. Reusch believes that everything in a treatment should be planned in workflow steps to minimize unforeseen events. In the Aha approach, Reusch has described a system where dental practitioners get the main workflow steps with guidance on a screen during treatments.
“The idea of using guided workflows is exactly the same feature we’ve built into the new digital XO FLOW unit – and seeing that Dr. Reusch is on the same path only confirms our own design concepts,” Kim says.
Using a workflow approach enables the dental practitioner to be well prepared while knowing every step of a treatment and being able to complete the treatment in a calm and controlled manner.
Getting a chance to see how Dr. Reusch uses these new systems in practice left Kim with lots of inspiration.
“The most interesting bit for me was to observe the dentists and follow them in their work and seeing how calm they were. The dental team had a clear structure, so there was never any anxiety, distress, or uncertainty about where to find the instruments, what to use or what to do. That’s probably the most impressive part,” Kim concludes after this rewarding visit to an old XO CARE friend.
Continue reading about ergonomics in dentistry
