How the Patent™ workflow differs from the conventional workflow.
How the reduced workflow saves time and cost.
How Magnus and his colleagues designed the reduced workflow.
Advise to young individuals working in the dental industry.
Magnus Persson
Head of Sales at Zircon Medical
He was drawn to the dental industry because it directly helps the end-users.
He’s especially drawn to implantology because it improves quality of life.
He helped streamline the dental implants workflow.
His primary goal is to spread awareness about zirconia implants’ viability.
Churerstrasse 66, 8852 Altendorf, Switzerland
Saving Time & Cost with the Patent™ Implant System’s Reduced Workflow
In Conversation with Magnus Persson
Most conventional dental implants involve a complex workflow with a relatively extensive chairtime, a wide range of instruments, specialized components and unpredictable costs. However, Magnus Persson and his colleagues have recently formulated a streamlined workflow that addresses most of the pain points associated with the conventional system, specifically designed to reduce treatment costs, increase predictability, reduce overall chairtime and improve the patient experience.
Benjamin Lutje, our head of digital marketing, recently hosted Magnus Persson on our Zircon Medical podcast series to discuss the Patent™ Implant System’s reduced workflow.
Introducing Magnus Persson, the Director of Sales at Zircon Medical
Magnus Persson has a long history and expertise with sales and business development. He’s the former VP of Global Sales Effectiveness at Nobel Biocare, the former Global Head of Sales and Business Development at Dental Axess, and the current Director of Sales at Zircon Medical.
With a background in engineering, Magnus could have worked in several fields, but he chose to specialize in the dental field because it’s an area that directly — and positively — affects the end-user. “I suppose I could have worked in designing weapons and cars,” Magnus says with a touch of humor, “but they wouldn’t have brought me personal satisfaction, even though they’re exciting technologies.” For him, getting into dental implants seemed like a natural fit because they have a demonstrably positive impact on the patients’ overall quality of life.
Over the years, Magnus has acquired immense theoretical expertise and knowledge on implants and prosthetic work. He has seen exceptional clinicians work and ply their trade, attended global and local scientific conferences, and learned all he could about dentistry. He believes anyone working within the medical industry should familiarize themselves with the larger picture, no matter what their individual role might be. Magnus’ extensive expertise and knowledge have led him to formulate a reduced workflow for dental implants that can save considerable time and costs while improving the patient experience.
How the Patent™ Implant System’s reduced workflow saves time and costs
When asked about formulating the reduced workflow, Magnus says: “To be able to work and develop workflows for efficiency improvements in the practice, you need to see a lot of procedures being done in different countries by different clinicians to see what the hiccups are. To materialize the savings and efficiency gains, you need to work from a procedure as well as product point of view.”
With Patent™, Magnus describes two highly-efficient workflows that should be compared to a one-stage surgery with a conventional system — the chairside workflow and the laboratory procedure.
Chairside Workflow
The following is a general overview of the chairside workflow: the implant is placed, you wait for the healing, cement the post, prepare it in the patient’s mouth, take a digital or conventional impression, have the laboratory fabricate the crown, and cement the crown during the next session.
This is a simple workflow requiring no specialized instruments or components. On average, this workflow can save the dentist about 30 minutes per implant, which adds up to around 3000 minutes for 100 implants, making it efficient.
Lab Procedure
The lab procedure reduces and streamlines the workflow even further while improving the patient experience. The following is an overview of the steps involved:
Place the implant.
Take impressions of the implant at the time of the surgery with a full-arch impression. You can take the impression during the surgery because of the predictability of the end position of the soft tissues. The conventional systems always lead to some remodeling or recession of the soft tissues, making them less predictable. But the Patent™ implant system ensures that the soft tissues stay in place, so the impressions can be taken during the surgery.
The impression is sent to the lab together with the glass fiber post.
The dental lab prepares the post on the model and fabricates the prosthetic restoration.
The patient returns after the healing time and the dentist can cement the post and the restoration in the second session.
The reduced workflow with the lab procedure cuts out an entire appointment, saving approximately 60 minutes since the impression is taken at the time of the surgery. On average, this workflow can save the dentist about 60 minutes per implant, which adds up to around 6000 minutes for 100 implants, making it far more efficient than the conventional systems.
Besides the increased efficiency, the reduced workflow also lowers the cost because there’s no need for additional accessories and components, such as specialized implant crowns. It also improves the patient experience because they have one less appointment, and all the work is done in the lab rather than in the patient’s mouth.
Magnus’ primary goal is to make dentists actively view zirconia implants as a viable alternative to titanium implants. When patients need implants, the dentist should no longer default to titanium implants but actively present the options. Zirconia implants are a perfectly valid option today, and patients need to be made aware of that.
You can also listen to Magnus in our Zircon Medical podcast or continue reading for a detailed article on the Patent™ Implant System’s reduced workflow.
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Saving Time & Cost with the Patent™ Implant System’s Reduced Workflow
An independent article by the Zircon Medical Team
In the previous section, we summarized our discussion with Magnus about the Patent™ Implant System’s reduced workflow. As highlighted above, the reduced workflow helps dentists reduce costs, reduce time, improve predictability, and improve the patient experience. It’s not about cutting corners or taking shortcuts but rather maximizing the implant system’s existing potential for optimal efficiency.
This article highlights the unique differences between the conventional workflow and the Patent™ Implant System’s reduced workflow.
Conventional Implant System vs. Patent™ Implant System
As shown in the accompanying graphical representation, the conventional dental implant workflow involves more visits, more chairtime, and more procedural costs than the Patent™ implant system. The following is a brief summary of the Patent™ dental implant system’s unique differences from conventional implants:
The impressions are taken during the surgical visit.
No need for a second visit for the sole purpose of taking impressions.
No need for healing abutments.
Simpler and faster prosthetic delivery.
No need for abutments, specialized implant crowns, screws, healing components, etc.
Using regular (cheaper) prosthetics that don’t involve specialized fabrication.
Significantly lower cost of components.
Preparation in the laboratory rather than in the patient’s mouth.
Simpler and faster final check-up.
Reduced time, reduced costs, improved patient experience.
How Patent™ Reduces Overall Time
The impression can be taken at the time of surgery
With conventional implants, the surgery and impression taking are separated into two visits. The Patent™ dental implant system combines the two steps — the impression is taken at the time of the surgery, so there’s no need for a separate visit.
When you work with titanium or conventional implants, you have to separate the surgical visit and the impression-taking visit to account for bone remodeling and tissue recession. Taking impressions during the surgical stage will produce inaccurate results because the patient’s clinical situation would have changed by the time the restoration is prepared.
However, Patent™ dental implants have a proven track record with bone level and keratinized tissue stability after the surgery. Our 3-years retrospective study (Brüll, 2014) confirms that the marginal bone levels remain stable and, in some cases, even increase. And our 2-years prospective study (Becker, 2017) confirms that keratinized gingiva volume increases or remains stable.
Because of the assurance of tissue stability, dental professionals can take impressions during the surgical stage itself. As such, in the 45 minutes it takes to complete the surgery, you can also take accurate impressions, saving considerable time for yourself and the patient.
While the conventional system requires two dental visits of approximately 45 minutes each, the Patent™ implant system combines the two process steps into a single 45-minute session.
Time Saved: 45 Minutes
The prosthetic delivery is a lot faster
Prosthetic delivery with conventional implants is challenging and time-consuming. You have to unscrew the healing abutments, screw in the permanent abutment, check the torque, seal the screw channel, and perform numerous other challenging and time-intensive steps.
Patent™ dental implants don’t involve healing abutments, screws, or most of the other components necessary with traditional implants. As such, you have to simply cement the post and provide the restoration. The process is a lot simpler and faster.
With conventional implants, the prosthetic delivery takes approximately 45 minutes. But the Patent™ dental implant system brings that down to around 35 minutes.
Time Saved: 10 Minutes
The final check-up is a lot faster
With conventional implants, the final check-up is a complicated process because you have to ensure the optimal functionality of each implant component — and there are many components to examine. You have to access/ inspect the screws, re-tighten them if they’re loosening, seal the access holes and polish the restoration, etc.
The Patent™ implant system doesn’t include these kinds of components, so the final check-up is considerably faster. You just make sure that the gums are healthy and that there is no excess cement left. Simply a normal visual control where there’s no need to access/remove components to check the situation.
With conventional implants, the final check-up takes approximately 20 minutes. But the Patent™ dental implant system brings that down to around 10 minutes.
Time Saved: 10 Minutes
How Patent™ Reduces Overall Cost
There’s no need for healing abutments
The conventional implant system necessitates the attachment of healing abutments on implants placed below the tissue level. You need a transmucosal component to protect the implant and to prevent the surrounding soft tissues from closing over the implant. Healing abutments are attached as placeholders during the first visit to protect the implant and then unscrewed or retrieved during impression taking and the prosthetic delivery.
However, the Patent™ dental implant system doesn’t need an additional healing abutment because it already includes a transmucosal part. If the Patent™ implant is placed according to the instructions, it already includes a part that maintains the level of the soft tissues. As such, you don’t need a healing abutment.
There’s no need for abutments, screws, and other specialized components
Besides the healing abutment, the conventional implant system includes various other components, such as the final abutment, abutment screws, specialized implant crowns, etc. Many times the clinical situation requires advanced prosthetic solutions that have to be prepared by specialized laboratories, making them costly.
With the Patent™ dental implant system, you don’t need abutments, abutment screws, etc. All you do need, such as the glass-fiber post, comes co-packed with the implant. This gives you perfect cost control. Furthermore, the final restoration is performed with a conventional crown, which is far more affordable than special implant crowns.
Predictable and accurate cost estimates
The components used for conventional implant systems varies significantly from case to case depending on implant placement, angulation etc. Sometimes the lab has to utilize more expensive components than predicted, resulting in higher cost than in the estimate. This leads to uncertainty when communicating the price to the patient and could potentially have a negative impact on the margins. The more advanced solutions that are required, the more the labs will charge for their expertise.
The Patent™ dental implant system includes all the components you need for the surgical and prosthetic procedures. As such, you don’t face any risk of having negative surprises in terms of additional component costs etc. Since you don’t need any additional components or special technical expertise, the cost of the entire workflow is predictable and uniform.
How Patent™ Improves Patient Experience
All dental procedures must cater to the patient’s overall experience. There’s no point in reducing the system’s costs and time if it adversely affects the patient’s experience. However, the Patent™ dental implant system improves the patient experience.
In terms of time, the Patent™ dental implant system saves the patient significant chairtime and cuts out one entire dental visit. In terms of experience, all the prosthetic work is done in the lab rather than in the patient’s mouth. No one likes a dentist — no matter how skilled — poking around inside their mouths any longer than absolutely necessary.
Calculate Your Savings with the Patent™ Dental Implant System
You might like to know how much time you can save with the Patent™ dental implant system compared to conventional implants. We’ve designed an innovative calculator tool that gives you an immediate estimation of the time you can save with a specific amount of implants. Simply enter the number of implants you want to calculate for, whether that’s 10, 500, 800, etc., and hit “calculate.” The system will estimate your overall savings in terms of time.
We would have loved to produce a similar tool to calculate your cost savings as well. However, as we established earlier in this article, the overall cost of conventional implants is incredibly unpredictable due to various factors, such as lab costs and advanced components, so we can’t give you an exact estimate of your cost savings. But your overall cost savings will also be significant.