20th Anniversary Conference Shows Just How Far PDA Has Come

There were social activities, a trip to Top Golf, fun breakfast and lunch discussions, and also visits from a Hall of Fame football star and his team’s famous cheerleaders, but when all was said and done, the 20th anniversary Productive Dentist Academy (PDA) conference in Texas was all about education on how to improve production at dental offices and how to provide better care to patients.

The PDA conference took place September 12-14 at the Hyatt Regency in Frisco, Texas, just a short drive from the Dallas Cowboys headquarters. The first 2 days were filled with great lectures, break-out sessions and technology demonstrations broken off into 3 main categories—productivity, investment grade practices (IGP), and Clinical Calibration.

The conference wrapped up Saturday following lectures from a pair of clinicians who shared their stories on practice and life success—Maggie Augustyn, DDS, FAAIP, FICIO, and Eric J. Roman, DDS—along with a media roundtable discussion moderated by PDA Chief Communications Officer Regan Robertson, who co-hosts Everyday Practices Dental Podcast along with Chad Johnson, DDS.

The roundtable, Tomorrow’s Dental Care: A Discussion with the Dental Media, included 5 veteran dental editors—Dr. Pamela Maragliano-Muniz of Dental Economics, Stan Goff of Dental Products Report, Anne Duffy of Dental Entrepreneur, Dr. Thomas Giacobbi of Dentaltown, and Kevin Henry of DrBicuspid.com. PDA and AcceptCare, the first all-in-one fee and treatment presentation software for dental offices, hosted the presentation.

Following are just some more of the many highlights from the event.

Chairside Efficiencies
Texas dentist Joshua Prentice, DDS, spoke Friday morning on how integrating AI-powered chairside solutions from Glidewell have transformed his Flower Mound, Texas practice. Dr Prentice uses the fastmill.io in-office mill from Glidewell and it’s worked so well he has 3 systems in his practice.

He says the digital workflow is so efficient that his dental assistant can handle the design process while he is preparing to deliver the same-day crowns. Eliminating the need for traditional crown seat appointments, the technology increases his productivity dramatically and increases the patient experience.

“All of this technology just makes you a better clinician,” he says. “You’re more efficient and you’re saving time and money not having a second appointment. It improves the patient experience because they have to take off work [for a second appointment] and some are fearful of coming in the first place. Now we have raving fans.”

He added that Glidewell does a great job with training and support of the glidewell.io™ In-Office Solution, which combines the power of fastmill.io with exclusive CrownAI™ technology to eliminate the learning curve from crown design. Users can deliver single-appointment BruxZir® NOW zirconia restorations straight from the mill with no oven wait.

Speaking of AI
Overjet and AcceptCare/OrthoFi presented on Friday morning on different ways that AI can help practices be more efficient.

Parag Kachalia, DDS, head of clinical practice for Overjet, demonstrated how the company’s AI technology continues to enhance the way dentists treat patients as well as improve the patient’s overall experience. His course, titled, “Introducing Our Newest Colleague…Dr. A.I.”, provided a snapshot of AI’s impact on clinical diagnostics, patient outcomes, and practice efficiency.

If used properly, the technology can enhance patient care and help practices thrive, he says. He explained how Overjet comes into practices and does an analysis of 12 months of radiographs, and the trained algorithms can provide key statistics on missed caries and perio issues.

“It’s a tool,” he warns. “You’re still the dentist. AI is not doing the examination. It’s a behavior change in dentistry but it’s noting unethical. With this AI you show patients what’s happening in their mouth and they can choose not to treat it. Most of the time they see the visualization and say yes.”

Oliver Gelles, chief marketing officer of OrthoFi, followed Dr Kachalia with a course on using AI to boost confidence and case acceptance. The talk covered best practices, key considerations, and ROI metrics to effectively enhance treatment acceptance rates and improve the overall performance of dental practices.

Noting that buy now pay later is here to stay, Gelles explained how AI can help patients with spending and financing decisions, and how practices can use technology to develop an automated pending management system that assists in rising conversion rates.

How It All Began
Bruce B. Baird, DDS, sat down with Dental Products Report on Friday to talk about how PDA got its start 20 years ago. The avid sports fan was wearing a Dallas Cowboys jersey as the football-themed conference was held in Frisco, Texas, home of the Dallas football team’s headquarters. The keynote speech Thursday afternoon was made by Emmitt Smith, who helped the Dallas Cowboys win 3 Super Bowls in the 1990s and is the league’s all-time leading rusher with 18,355 yards after breaking the record previously held by Walter Payton.

The theme carried over to Friday when some Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders made an appearance, first cheering on the PDA’s newest Hall of Fame class of dental professionals, and then taking photos with attendees.

Dr Baird, who had a successful practice driven many years ago in part by utilizing 3 Sirona CAD/CAM CEREC systems long before most dentists were using the in-office chairside milling technology, said PDA began when gathered 8 clinician friends 20 years ago to talk about how to increase productivity.

“You know, it really started 20 years ago,” he explains. “I've been productive. I was using milling machines 15 years ago, doing same-day smiles and I was doing fairly large numbers for a dentist. My buddies were asking how I was doing it, and said, ‘What are you doing?’ So, I said, why don't we just do a course?”

There were maybe 11 dentists the second time around and 14 the third year, Dr Baird recalls. But PDA has really grown in the last 2 decades and this year’s event included separate learning tracks on productivity, investment grade practices (IGP), and Clinical Calibration. Most attendees experience large production increases and many return to the annual events, he says. As the conference grew, so did the number of attendees from each practice, as dental assistants, managers and hygienists have all become part of the program, which covers not just technology and clinical techniques, but hiring, training, leadership, and more.

On Friday afternoon Ben Lund and Sal DaiZovi of PDA gave a course on mastering the media to assist clinicians in getting published and helping them become leaders in their communities, while Saturday morning’s roundtable discussion featured media veterans from Dental Products Report and other journals with a focus on helping clinicians and their teams to better understand the media’s role in the industry. The roundtable was sponsored by AcceptCare and PDA and was live streamed.

“It’s a family culture. We love doing this,” Dr Baird adds. “The way we built Productive Dentist Academy was to have a system of continuous growth at a very predictable level. I could predictably tell you exactly what I was going to make in my pocket the next month before we went to that month because of the way we set up our scheduling, the way we set up everything. I think increasing your production is one thing, but if you don't have the consistency of your expenses, then, you know, I would be really happy on the good months and then depressed on the other months. That's how it started, and it's grown every year until now.”

There’s More

Courses geared toward financial planning and even a hygiene roundtable were part of the 2024 agenda at PDA.

Also on end were a number of vendors demonstrating products and services from a robotic implant solution (Yomi by Neocis) to RipeGlobal’s hands-on training and on-demand learning content, and Millennium Dental Technologies’ lasers.

Earlier this year, the academy announced PDA’s Alliance Partners, all of which were involved in this year’s conference. They include: AcceptCare, Dentist Advisors, Dentist Job Connect, Five Lakes Dental Practice Solutions, Mango Voice, Medix Dental IT, Overjet AI, Perio Protect, ProFi 20/20, Support DDS, CariFree, E-Assist Dental Solutions, Financially Led (formerly Cash Flow Coach), Smile Advantage, The Mint Door, and Tasty Clean.