Patients are amazed when they visit our office and see the modern technology in use. Dr. Garlitz is an expect in digital dental technology and lectures on the subject...and our dental team puts his knowledge to use every day for the benefit of our patients.
Click below to view each topic and check out the links showing examples of each technology!
Recording and monitoring the presence and progression (or lack of) dental decay is very important. We use computerized charting to record disease and to treatment plan needs. Click here for an example chart.
Laser-aided Diagnosis of decay
Identifying the presence and treating or monitoring the progression (or lack of) dental decay is very important. We use laser-aided diagnosis to accomplish this goal - the Diagnodent.
Computer Charting of gum disease
Recording and monitoring the presence and progression (or lack of) gum disease is paramount as trends and changes indicate progression of disease. We use computerized charting to record disease and to explain health status to our patients. Graphical charts show changes much more effectively that just hearing the numbers that we measure around the tooth. Click here for an example periodontal chart.
A picture paints a thousand words! We use a special camera that take images of teeth inside the mouth. We use the images to communicate properly the status of health or disease. These images are created and saved as part of a paper reduced digital chart using hardware such as the USB Schick Camera.
The dental treatment room would not be a hygienic area with wires dangling all over. Probably would be an obstacle course danger as well. To solve this issue we use the latest in wireless technology. Click here to see the wireless keyboard/mouse used in our office.
Dental x-rays (radiographs) are an important an important aspect of your preventive care. Taking films does involve a minimal amount of radiation, not unlike getting a short amount of sunlight.
Traditional x-rays are based upon the use of packets of film. We use two different computer based systems to reduce exposure time and provide more flexible diagnosis...the Schick digital sensor based x-ray and denoptix phosphor plate digital imaging. The film-free images become part of our patient's digital computer-based chart.
We only have two hands and many task to perform with them. Computers often require our input by hand at the same time those highly trained hands are needed for your care. To help with this issue we use voice recognition technology. This is integrated within our dental software (click to view).
CAD-CAM Porcelain Construction
CAD-CAM or computer aided designed is a buzzword in industry. In the dental office wouldn't it be nice if porcelain crowns/prostheses could be made in the office and cemented the same day? With Cerec technology this is possible and with help of Dr. M. Amir of London (England) his son Dr. Simon Amir will be bringing this technology into our office this Fall (2003).
Over the 21 years in Hawthorne we have seen around 10,000 patients. The amount of paperwork is immense. We are converting our office to a paper reduced office through the use of clinical digital tools and the same for the front desk. This includes the use of scanners. Finding documents becomes is easy and efficient when they are all stored in your digital chart.
Prescriptions are generated by our software which allows us to manage the myriad of choices and drug conflicts. The pharmacy appreciates the computer printed prescription, rather than reading our hand-writing. Now if there were only standards for digitally sending them in over the phone line...
A large part of the cost of care is employee time. Managing appointments, chart records, insurance, and billing takes up very valuable time. We use computer tools for every aspect of our business that we can. Click here to view some of the tools we use. Dr. Garlitz has written a course on this topic as it relates to the Internet (click here). He has also written a course about clinical tools as they relate to the Internet (click here). (Both courses were written for the Florida Dental Association and are also available on their Web site, www.floridadental.org).