Upgrading from analog
For Dr Viorela Bauer, a powerhouse dental clinic owner from California, it all began with wanting a better alternative to analog wax ups for full mouth restoration cases. "I was struggling with my full mouth cases because the wax ups were so expensive - around $1800 for 20 teeth,” she says. Avoiding this cost meant that explaining treatment plans and helping patients to visualize outcomes required creative workarounds like placing cotton rolls in patients’ mouths to show how opening up their bite would look.
When Viorela became a DSD Clinic and began to use the DSD Planning Center, these tricks were no longer necessary thanks to cost-effective digital wax ups. “It was then that I realized there was a value I did not know about; I could do this even for simple cases. Before, I only had trouble with large cases, but now it has become a way of doing dentistry even with simple cases,” she continues.
Another reason she turned to DSD was for all-on-four and all-on-x cases. Previously she had done her own treatment planning using an implant provider software, but it was a challenge to integrate, make a surgical guide and retrofitted dentures. “The DSD Clic-Guide was another thing that sold me on DSD. I realized then that I could do everything guided and with greater precision,” she adds.
“What the DSD Planning Center does really well is that its products and services are inclusive and integrated. I like the fact that everything comes together; so I can get my designs and print my products myself, mill my crowns in-clinic or DSD can do it for me,” she comments. This flexibility extends to the cases, as she explains, “it's more than just a design that you get, it continues, so you add Invisalign planning or a clic-guide, for example.”
Having experienced the frustration and expense of relying on piecemeal solutions from different providers where nothing integrates with each other, Viorela is keenly aware of her clinic’s gains in efficiency and accuracy when outsourcing smile design and treatment planning to DSD.
“What the DSD Planning Center does really well is that its products and services are inclusive and integrated. I like the fact that everything comes together.”
Further implementation advantages
“Case acceptance has definitely gone up,” she says, adding that patients are charged for the digital smile design, but this is significantly less than the analog design. “The patients get it and they understand the value of it. This is because I believe in it and I understand the value, so I can communicate that to them,” she continues.
She explains that nowadays she does not share a treatment plan with a patient unless the design has been done. “I don't talk about prices to them unless I have the design,” she adds.
"DSD also helped me see and understand even more of the dentistry that I probably didn't see and didn't understand before. Now, I look at every patient as a smile design."
In 2020, having built a 21 year career Viorela felt bored of dentistry and believes this is what ultimately led her to find DSD. “I wanted to make dentistry more exciting. I took courses in implant dentistry, started doing Invisalign but something was still missing. I was searching for something. I didn't know what it was, but I knew there must be a better way of doing dentistry than what I was doing at the time.”
She attended her first DSD course and tried out 2D smile designs with the DSD App, and soon realized how 3D smile design would enable her to complete a case, not just sell it. As part of her implementation journey, she completed the online DSD Residency 1 course with her entire team, which she found incredibly helpful. She then undertook the in-clinic DSD Consultancy to further finesse the clinic workflows in an enjoyable, team-building way.
Being part of the DSD Clinic community was another game-changer for her. “It's really refreshing to meet people that are as passionate and driven about dentistry as you are. Having this community keeps you motivated and inspired,” she explains.
The transformation in Viorela is most evident by how much she enjoys her work nowadays. “It’s more fun and exciting. I wake up and look forward to my day, knowing new patients will accept their treatment plans; it's extremely rewarding,” she adds. This change in motivation also gave her the confidence to move into a new and bigger clinic space.
She has the following advice for dentists who are considering getting started with DSD. “It's a transition, but once you try it and you see the benefits of it, you just can't do without it. There's no going back.”
“It helped me see and understand even more of the dentistry that I probably didn't see and didn't understand before. Now, I look at every patient as a smile design.”
