When you get an offer from a big dental implant company – to teach younger dentists on how to perform the treatment, you know that you must be doing something right to get noticed by them.
But this kind of recognition isn’t always a good thing.
My whole ethos, from the beginning, has always been to ‘do the right thing for the patient.’
This is why I left NHS dentistry (working with limited materials, and restrictions does not help patients in the long term… it just makes them feel okay in the short term, knowing that they have spent the least amount of money as possible)
And more importantly, I have never been tied in with any supplier/lab/dental implant company.
Yes, there are some suppliers that I prefer and sometimes they give me some “free stuff” (like a £600 instrument, that only a dentist can get excited about!)
But I have always been free to use whatever I felt was the right implants for my patient.
So, how does this tie in with my teaching offers?
Well, one was from a company that I have never heard of before. I can’t even remember them as I write this; I would need to go back and check my emails!
Anyway, the only reason I have heard about this company is that I have a patient who I am helping, who had his implants done abroad, and now they are all failing.
Now, in this case, the wrong implants were used and it looks like the dentist did not have a clue on best practices… even though “this is all he did”.
Removing implants is not easy, so I contacted the company who made the implants, they put me in touch with their KOL (key opinion leader) in the UK, who then asked me if I would like to teach on his program… The program was somehow linked to a teaching institution.
BUT
I would have to use their dental implants for the cases that I presented.
This kind of goes against my choice of using the best implant for the job… Now, granted, there are many similar implants, and for a single type of treatment – there are several that would work well.
I think my biggest hesitation would be to use an implant system that I have never heard of.
I would effectively be testing it on my paying patients, who put a lot of trust in me to use the best stuff!
So I turned that opportunity down.
The other one was a little more interesting, it was from Megagen implants – who are well known, and generally a pretty good company.
I also get on well with the company, even though I rarely buy anything from them.
So, they introduced me to a collection of dental practices, that were looking for a dentist to place the dental implants for their patients.
I am crazy busy, my answer was, “no… – but let me hear what you have to say! ”
In addition, Megagen could send dentists to me, who I would mentor, and they could learn cases, using the Megagen dental implant.
Well, I have no problem using Megagen, they have different types of implants, and it’s a good system.
I think in this case if the referring dentist has a preference, (and it’s a good preference), I would agree to use the implant. Anything else (teaching opportunities etc) would be a bonus.
This is a set-up that I would consider.
The point of this post is that if you look at this from a patient perspective, they could have any dental implant placed, and they would not know any different.
Some dental implants are better than others, and it is possible that external factors could influence which type of implant used. Rather than what is the best implant for that situation, such as dentist associations with suppliers, and in this case, teaching arrangements.
In my world, I try to keep it very simple; either someone is a customer, or not. Customers are either patients seeking help with their smile, or dentists looking to learn how we treat the more complex cases.
Either way, each group must get the best value for money. After all, they are trusting me to deliver something of value, and I cannot cut corners or get distracted by shiny things that get in the way of my core values.
