Thanks to the digital transformation of the healthcare industry, today's dental care has radically changed for the better. Advancements brought by AI computers look to provide even more potent tools for dentists, from precise patient diagnosis to greater administrative management and support.
- What is AI in Dental Care
- How is AI Used in Dentistry
- Benefits of AI in Dental Practice
- AI Dental Care: Challenges and Considerations
What is AI in Dental Care
Artificial intelligence (AI) is the development of computer systems capable of performing tasks usually associated with human thinking: learning, reasoning, and decision-making, to name a few. For AI in dentistry, systems like Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Learning (ML) are used to obtain and analyze large volumes of data, identify patterns in them, and make accurate predictions to meet dental-related objectives (for example, custom implants).
How is AI Used in Dentistry
A major feature of AI is its broad application across an industry's numerous departments and functions. The sprawling healthcare industry, for example, includes hospitals, medical offices, providers, and non-medical areas like insurance agencies, coders and billers.
AI finds itself similarly useful across the dentistry industry.
Diagnostic Tools
Digital dentistry allows dentists to gather large amounts of information on patients' conditions through tools like radiographs, intraoral scans, and 3-D imaging. AI using ML then sorts and analyzes that information much faster and more precisely than humans. Dentists display the results on their medical AI box PCs to diagnose the patient's issues more accurately and tailor more personalized treatment and preventive care plans.
Administrative Aids
Dental practices are businesses, and dentists are turning to AI to manage many of the routine but necessary tasks. For example, AI scribes and other clinical documentation programs can update patients' electronic medical records (EMR) as the dentist chats with the patient in real time. Other programs automate billing insurance companies and finding out why they’re reluctant to pay.
Personal Patient Assistants
Telehealth allows today's dental patients access to their providers' many offerings without going directly to the office or making a call. Patients can bring up their medical records on their smartphones and PCs, make payments, and schedule appointments 24/7. AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants using NPL make these tasks easier and more intuitive.
Benefits of AI in Dental Practice
The above sample applications of AI in dentistry result in several benefits to providers and patients.
- Improved patient outcomes thanks to early detection of pathologies like gum disease.
- Better end results due to increased accuracy in procedures requiring precise placement, like dental implantation.
- More time for patient care thanks to streamlined administrative processes like appointment setting and reminders.
- Reduced patient discomfort and recovery time through AI-driven dental robots and other forms of healthcare automation.
- Personalized dental treatment plans derived from patient EMR, genetic information, lifestyle factors, and treatment records.
AI Dental Care: Challenges and Considerations
Bringing AI tools to dentistry faces three interlinked issues.
The first is data, or lack of. AI algorithms or commands rely on extensive datasets to work properly. Unfortunately, dental datasets are frequently too small or unevenly organized for AIs to learn from properly. Dental practitioners and healthcare IT must work together to properly obtain and organize the wealth of information from personal records, X-rays, MRI images, and other forms of patient data.
Resolving the above issue sheds light on the second issue. Many dental practices use varying EMR and imaging systems. Many, if not most, are non-compatible with each other or walled off from sharing data by their companies ("silo"). Dental practices and their healthcare IT must ensure their computer systems are integrated and interoperable for AI to function at its full potential.
The third and final issue is compliance. Data stored in those medical computers and data must be HIPAA-compliant to protect patient privacy and safeguard sensitive information. This is especially true when giving non-Covered Entities access to patient data to feed AI datasets. Again, the dental practice's IT staff will be responsible for ensuring compliance.
Run Your Dental Practice AI Tools On Cybernet Computers
The digital transformation of healthcare has influenced dentistry with new tools like MRI and CAD/CAM technologies. AI is the latest such tool, and it looks to impact current and future dental practices in everything from periodontal disease detection to medical records management.
If you're looking to bring AI dental tools to your practice, contact the team at Cybernet Manufacturing. Like our standard medical computers and tablets, our AI computer solutions have been built from the ground up to meet dentistry's unique requirements. Our staff will cover them all, whether medical-grade certifications or legacy device compatibility. And it's not a problem if you can't find the right one among our pre-built models. We're an Original Equipment Manufacturer, and we can customize all our PCs to your practice's exact wants and needs.