A camera card with sixty images named IMG_
Orthodontic records mean a standard set of extraoral and intraoral photos, intraoral scans and often radiographs, taken at the start, during treatment and at debond. The photos come off a DSLR or a phone as a batch of files with camera-generated names. The scans export from software such as iTero or another scanner's own system.
A nurse sits at a computer at the end of the day, works out which images belong to which patient, renames them, and moves them into the patient's folder or imports them into the imaging system. It takes a while and is easy to get wrong.
When a practice uses phones as well as a camera, or several scanners across surgeries, the number of places images can land grows, and so does the chance that a batch sits on a device for days before anyone files it.
Why filing records is still manual
- Cameras do not know which patient they are photographing.
- Scanner and imaging systems do not always talk to the practice management system.
- Several patients' records are taken before anyone files them.
- Naming conventions differ between staff.
- Misfiled images are hard to find later.
What manual filing costs
Staff time at the end of every records day. Images filed against the wrong patient, which is a data protection problem as well as a clinical one. Records that cannot be found when the orthodontist wants to compare stages. And a reluctance to take progress records because filing them is a chore.
Misfiling tends to be discovered at the worst time: when the orthodontist wants to compare start and finish images, when a family asks for copies, or when records are needed for a transfer. By then, working out which images belong to whom is detective work.
The records import we build
- Before photos are taken, the nurse selects the patient on a tablet or scans a code from the appointment, which marks the start of that patient's batch.
- When the camera card or phone is uploaded, images are split into batches by that marker and by time, and matched to the right patient and appointment.
- Each image is named by patient, date, stage and view, following your naming convention.
- Where helpful, a model suggests which standard view each photo is, for the nurse to confirm with one tap.
- Scanner exports are picked up from the folder the scanner software writes to and matched by patient and date.
- Files are placed in your imaging system or records store, as it expects them.
- Anything that cannot be matched confidently goes to a short list for the nurse.
| Source | Matched by | Filed as |
|---|---|---|
| Camera or phone photos | Patient marker and time | Patient, date, stage, view |
| Intraoral scans | Patient and date in export | Patient, date, stage |
| Unmatched items | Not matched | Short list for a person |
Records filed before the patient leaves
Nurses spend moments confirming rather than time renaming. Images are consistently named and in the right place. Orthodontists can compare stages easily. And the risk of an image being filed under the wrong patient falls because matching is not done from memory at the end of the day.
Is this your records workflow?
- Photos are renamed and filed by hand.
- Scans and photos are stored in different places.
- Images have been filed against the wrong patient.
- Finding a particular stage's records takes time.