The technology revolution has affected various businesses, including the dental sector. Among the innovative solutions being offered, blockchain technology stands out due to its transformational potential. This decentralised, safe data capture technology has a lot to offer the dental industry.
Blockchain Technology in the Dental Practice
1. Maintaining Electronic Health Records: Patients who see multiple dentists may have to go through a number of time-consuming dental examination procedures. They can be asked to provide all of their medical and dental records, as well as fill out papers on multiple occasions. As a result, they might not be able to remember every medicine they have ever taken. Furthermore, if they don’t think certain underlying illnesses are that important, they can forget to bring them up. They might also have to undergo unnecessary dental X-rays, which would expose them to radiation several times.
Completing dental records and recording a patient’s oral and dental health can be difficult for dentists. This may result in lengthier therapy sessions and consultations that are less productive. A patient may potentially receive a false diagnosis if they are referred to another dentist. Blockchain technology, on the other hand, may be able to simplify this procedure, leading to shorter dental visits and better attention to detail.
Medical histories, prescription orders, vital signs, lab test results, radiography, doctor and nurse notes, routine dental checkups, and other Internet of Things (IoT) sources are all included in patients’ electronic health records, or EHRs
2.Dental Treatment Procedures: The safe storage and use of dental data for tailored patient treatment is made possible by blockchain and IoT technologies. This includes information about the composition of teeth, cavities, the rate at which endodontic or malignant lesions develop, how well teeth clean, and even the ecology of oral microorganisms. With the use of this data, clinicians can make better decisions regarding prevention, treatment, and overall decision-making.
A thorough report of the care provided, including details on the diagnosis, clinical findings, decision-making, materials utilised, and treatment methods, must be submitted by dentists. Here’s an alternative perspective on blockchain’s potential use in dentistry. Following the entry of this data into the blockchain system, each dentist is subsequently held accountable for their actions. Patients are less likely to make mistakes or ignore their treatment during therapy when they have access to their treatment information. Furthermore, the fact that treatment records cannot be changed without consent from both parties should help to avoid needless or unfair patient litigation against healthcare practitioners.
Prescribers may alter prescriptions for drugs based on information they have access to regarding a patient’s prior and present medication histories as well as any known sensitivities. During patient examinations, doctors can use this information to make well-informed judgements about which medications to prescribe and whether to forgo certain ones in order to avoid interfering with lab testing.
3.Enhancing Patients’ Motivation and Emotional Tolerance: Patients should take part in recall sessions on a regular basis in order to guarantee the success of most dental treatments. These visits should take place every two years to every three months, depending on their oral health. Additionally important to preserving general dental health, preventing disease, and spotting problems early on are yearly examinations. Regrettably, a lot of individuals experience dental anxiety, which makes them miss appointments and exacerbates their oral health issues.
We can enter more detailed data, such as a patient’s cooperation, their capacity to bear stress on both a physical and psychological level, and the dates of their recollection sessions, to enhance their care. With the use of AI-powered toothbrushes and a Bluetooth-connected phone app, we can also keep an eye on how often and how well they brush.
It is now feasible to protect and track a complete collection of data regarding patients’ brushing behaviours, including frequency, sufficiency, and inefficiency, by using blockchain technology and AI algorithms. Potential smartphone apps can then be used to keep an eye on patients’ eating patterns.
blockchain technology’s application to dental supply chain management.
With enhanced sustainability, efficiency, authenticity, traceability, and recall management, blockchain technology has enormous potential to revolutionise supply chain management in the dental industry. As we continue to research and use this cutting-edge technology, there will undoubtedly be significant benefits for both patients and dental professionals.
1.Changing Traceability with Blockchain Technology: Blockchain technology has the potential to totally change the tracking of dental supplies from production to distribution. A tamper-proof digital identity on the blockchain may be used to uniquely identify any thing, even dental floss and implants. The ability for stakeholders to track each item as it passes through the supply chain allows for an unmatched level of traceability and transparency.
2.Boosting Productivity and Lowering Errors: We can significantly lower human error and streamline processes by implementing blockchain technology for data management in the dental supply chain. Blockchain-based automated digital records have the potential to replace paper-based solutions. By doing this, errors are reduced and procedures are sped up considerably, saving time and resources.
3.Verifying the Authenticity of Dental Supplies: The existence of fake dental products puts patient safety and the credibility of dental practitioners in grave danger. Blockchain technology can help with this problem’s resolution. The provenance and movements of dental supplies are tracked on an immutable blockchain, facilitating the verification of authenticity at each point in the supply chain and contributing to the elimination of counterfeit products.
4. Enhancing the management of recalls: Recalls of dental supplies can be challenging and intricate processes. Blockchain can speed up and improve the efficiency of the recall process. Every product’s journey is tracked by the blockchain, which makes it much simpler to identify a faulty batch and take immediate action to lower patient risk.
5.Promoting Sustainability: Blockchain can also help promote sustainability in the dental industry. By tracking the lifecycle of dental supplies, from raw material sourcing to disposal, we can identify opportunities for reducing environmental impact and promoting responsible practices. The transparency provided by blockchain can encourage dental supply manufacturers to prioritize sustainability.
Can blockchain technology help with dental technology development and research?
1. Integration of blockchain technology with other platforms: By fusing diagnosis and treatment, a number of technological trends, including biotech, information technology, nanomedicine, Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, augmented intelligence, social media, blockchain, personalised medicine, EHRs, wearables, etc., are being incorporated into healthcare to improve patient outcomes.
Blockchain technology, when coupled with IoT, AI, and machine learning, has the potential to totally change digital health economies by enabling devices to interact with one another and share trustworthy data in real time. As a result, technology will become the focal point of communication rather than people. Blockchain technology can be used to manage and coordinate the functioning of many IoT-connected devices.
In doing so, it improves transaction processing, guards against errors, and builds a pliable structure that can hold real things. The safe characteristics of blockchain contribute to the preservation of data privacy and trust, lower costs by doing away with middlemen, and speedy one-to-one transactions. Processing times are shortened as a result, from days to seconds.
2.Research data management for oral health: A tremendous quantity of patient-generated and health data has been gathered as a result of the globalisation of the digital economy. Clinical trials may make use of this data, or it may be distributed to medical professionals for use in referral procedures. Efficient management of health data entails maintaining data integrity during collection and storage, as well as providing user-friendly apps with quick access and filtering capabilities to facilitate interoperability.
To improve research outcomes, it is important for patients, dentists, statisticians, organizations, and committees to easily share information. The use of blockchain technology can accelerate and secure this process. This shift in data authority from clinics and corporations to patients and those directly involved in the information could greatly benefit the research field
3.Enhancement of clinical trial quality: Patients have the option to grant researchers short-term access to certain sections of their information. Based on the study’s inclusion criteria, this procedure aids in the patient selection for clinical research, leading to quicker, higher-quality trials with a bigger sample size. Researchers can use historical data for potential future uses and gain access to the most useful group of data.
Researchers are looking through historical medical archives to discover novel approaches and cures for uncommon illnesses. But researching these illnesses without access to demographic datasets is difficult.
Similar to this, patients can use a pseudonym to submit information for research into uncommon or little-studied disorders. This makes it possible for people who don’t trust research institutions to be more actively involved in the field and who might otherwise be less inclined to participate in research or to go unreported because of facilities or accessibility issues.
Additionally, blockchain technology permits cryptographic authentication of transactions, guaranteeing data authenticity and integrity certification and thwarting malevolent manipulations. Every user keeps an open record of all data that can be tracked thanks to time stamping.
In conclusion, the decentralised, transparent, and secure characteristics of blockchain technology have the potential to fundamentally alter the dental sector. The opportunities are numerous and revolutionary, ranging from improving supply chain management to driving technical developments and research to optimising operations in dental clinics.
Unprecedented levels of efficiency, security, and growth in the dental sector could be unlocked by using blockchain technology as we continue to navigate its future. A new age in healthcare is heralded by the combination of blockchain technology with dentistry, which holds the potential to improve patient and practitioner outcomes.