If you work with dental implants OR abutments, current AHPRA and ADA regulations (MCNZ and NZDA regulations for New Zealand practices) stipulate that patient records need to be accurately recorded and stored for a minimum of 7 years (10 years and 1 day for New Zealand practices).

To have accurate records (to enable identification of dental implants and abutments), practices should be recording implant or abutment Lot/Batch and Reference numbers. If this was associated with a customised prosthesis (CAD/CAM) details of this should also be included in patient records.

Furthermore, these details must be provided to the patient at their request at any time in the future. The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner indicates that patients should receive their information within 30 days.

For those that also work with high risk dental implants (such as zygomatic implants and osseoframes), it is a mandatory requirement that these patients require a Patient Implant Card (PIC). This is a physical/digital card that must be filled in by your practice and given to the patient.

By recording your patients details on the DIR, you meet all your regulatory requirements listed above, by

• Securely storing your patients implant records for their lifetime

• Recording all relevant implant/abutment component information

• Giving patients instant access to their own records

• All records are a digital version of the PIC

While most practices keep good patient records, in the DIR’s experience, the majority of practices have experienced some form of delay when attempting to obtain or share a patients’ implant/abutment records.

The DIR makes this process instantaneous, reducing the burden to your administrative team and helps provide a better patient outcome.

DIR registered information is accessible within minutes for your practice. This means that there is minimal administrative burden on your practice and you can treat a patient significantly faster meaning the patient problems can be addressed and treated more efficiently.

Alternatively, if you are having a request for patient information, you can forward the DIR registration quickly and easily, again reducing your administrative burden.

The DIR registrations also improve communication between dental professionals and laboratories by ensuring labs know the exact components they need to utilise in the manufacture of the prostheses. This reduces the amount of revision of laboratory work that labs often need to do, saving money and time for all parties.

One of the biggest issues face is the accurate identification of implants that they are restoring. Implant manufacturer representatives provide positive feedback on how the DIR registrations make the laboratory work more efficient and more accurate when they are assisting their dental professionals.

Most practices have had a case of a patient presenting with an unknown implant (for some this is even a frequent occurrence). This is a significant issue for a number of reasons:

• It prolongs the treatment (and pain) of the patient

• Staff time is wasted contacting previous clinician/practice

• Increase the risk of complications

In the cases where the old records are no longer available (lost/destroyed), dental professionals are then forced to essentially guess what components were utilised. This can sometimes be costly and time consuming, and still not give accurate results.

By registering your patients dental implant/abutment components on the DIR, you are part of the solution to this problem.

All records will be securely stored for the patients lifetime, and accessible (privacy laws apply) by their future treating dental professionals.

This helps to eliminate this issue for all future treatment.

To have accurate records (to enable identification of dental implants and abutments), practices should be recording implant or abutment Lot/Batch and Reference numbers. If this was associated with a customised prosthesis (CAD/CAM) details of this should also be included in patient records.

Without this information, future treatment cannot be undertaken safely. For example:

• If you can't identify the exact component that was installed, you won’t know which equipment (e.g. driver) to use to repair or maintain the implant/crown reconstruction

• If you use the wrong tools and damage the componentry, you may have to replace the damaged components (potentially at a cost to your practice)

By registering your patients implant components on the DIR, you are ensuring the information recorded is not only accurate, but also relevant and accessible for future treating dental professionals.

The DIR helps you record all this in one simple process via our online application, with registrations only taking 1-2 minutes. The registration then creates an easy-to-read PDF that can be accessed by the patient or their future dental professionals, ensuring the best long term care!

The DIR is regularly contacted by patients who are looking for dental professionals they can trust that offer high quality treatment and componentry.

As part of the benefits the DIR provides to our users, we direct these patients towards DIR Registered Practices near them. All practices that register on the DIR are added to our Find a DIR Dentist search function, which is also accessible by patients.

Did you know, many of your patients who require bone grafts are also blood donors. If your patient is a blood donor this can affect their ability to donate blood, either temporarily or even permanently!

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Whether your patient is a blood donor should be a question every dental professional asks their patients prior to implant surgery (if bone grafting is required). This ensures you know the needs of your patient and do not affect their donation status. Failure to do so could result in legal issues.

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Did you know the DIR also records bone grafting details with our implant registrations? This helps to assist your practice and patients by:

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• Providing a simple downloadable PDF that patients can present at any blood bank to help determine their eligibility

• Ensuring the identity of the grafting material is retained securely, to cater for any changes that may be made to blood donation requirements in the future

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Ensure you are discussing with your patients, that require bone grafts, prior to implant surgery about their blood donation status, and ensure this data is accessible by third parties (with patient approval), such as the blood bank, by registering these details on the DIR today!