The other day a Dental Assistant named Mandy sat down with a patient in operatory #2 for a simple Crown Prep procedure. Going through the procedure effortlessly as she has many times before, Mandy and Dr. Pearson were wrapping up with only the placement of the temporary crown left to execute. Mandy reached over to her operatory drawer to grab the temporary bond that is in the same place as in all of the operatories. To her surprise she realized that there was no bonding agent stocked in its usual place. No big deal, she swiftly shuffled over to operatory #1 to that same drawer. Once again she was surprised to see no bonding agent available and in its place were a couple of impression trays and a few cotton rolls.
Mandy was now getting a little frustrated knowing that the new assistant they recently hired was just in that operatory doing a Crown Prep a couple hours ago and must have used the last of the bonding agent and did not restock the operatory, along with making a mess of the other procedural materials inside the drawer. Now, Mandy is upset because her patient has been waiting for about 5 minutes as she gracefully dances around other staff and patients to find a small bottle of bonding agent to complete her hour long procedure.
Mandy’s last resort is to go through sterilization to the back closet in hopes of finding this bonding agent in stock and luckily…10 were left. 5 had expired and the other 5 were good for the next couple of weeks. A total of 7 minutes has gone by and instead of being done with the procedure; Mandy and Dr. Pearson are placing the temporary crown 5 minutes over the estimated procedure time and have another Crown Prep patient sitting out in the waiting room. Will Mandy remember to restock that bonding agent in the operatories?
The Portable Drawer
A Tub is a dental practice’s best friend. It keeps operatory drawers clutter free for commonly used items, stores only procedure specific materials and can be placed in sterilization ready for the next procedure with no same day prep needed. This eliminates the situation of depleted materials that are forgotten about prior to a procedure that caused Mandy so many issues.
The Money Maker
With a cover, the tub sits right next to chairside protecting and supplying everything that an operatory drawer can. The most important difference between the drawer and the dental tub is restocking. You are only restocking 1 tub for your procedures compared to keeping inventory in 1, 2 or 5 operatory drawers. This will put a tight squeeze on your inventory allowing a dental practice to save money from throwing away expired procedural materials and by keeping better counts on the others.
Only 1 Tub is needed to accommodate 1 procedure if it is performed 15 times or less in a week. To learn more about how to use a Tub for your procedure setups, check out the Get Organized page or download a FREE Material Management Guide here.
