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Dental Drills and Tinnitus
The drill is one of the biggest problems that tinnitus patients face when it comes time to have dental work done. Many procedures in dentistry require the drill to be used. There is no way to put in a filling or doing a root canal without the drill. The drill makes a loud, high-pitched sound that can damage your hearing.
Wearing ear protection won't help much with the drills. You can plug your ear all you want. But the loud drilling noise doesn't really affect your ears through your ear canal. It creates sound and vibrates your jaw bones, which then travel up to your ears. Therefore, the damage to your ears is being causedwithin your head, not from the outside.
So, wearing earplugs won't do you any good here. We recommend that you tell your dentist to use short bursts of drilling instead of a prolonged technique. This will minimize the damage caused to your cochlea; it's not perfect, but it is better than the alternative. The drilling doesn't cause tinnitus, but it can make existing symptoms much worse.
Fillings and Tinnitus
There is a connection between tinnitus, and those unsightly fillings that dentists use to remove cavities. We are referring to amalgam fillings which are made from silver and mercury. You might think amalgam fillings are mostly made of silver. In fact, they contain more mercury than silver.
The obvious problem here is the mercury, something which is shown to cause neurological issues, mercury poisoning, and of course death. A filling or two is usually not a big deal, but if you have more than that in your mouth, it can be a legitimate cause of your worsening tinnitus symptoms. It has been shown that people with multiple mercury fillings in their mouths absorb on average more mercury per day than the World Health Organization deems acceptable.
These fillings, due to the high levels of mercury in your blood, can cause tinnitus, or worsen existing symptoms. We aren't going to get into the exact science of things, but the bottom line is that mercury-based fillings can have an impact on tinnitus. Your best bet is to ask for composite resin fillings, something which we would recommend regardless of tinnitus.
Jaw Clenching
The technical term for jaw clenching, bruxism is another thing that can cause tinnitus and make existing symptoms worse. Clenching your jaw can cause serious nerve damage.
Seeing as everything in your head is connected in one way or another, constantly clenching your jaw can affect the nerves in your ears. It is not a serious problem, as the causes of clenching are usually easy to solve. There are also special treatments that can help reduce the severity of your clenching, such as using a mouth guard.
Dentistry and Tinnitus - Other Causes
There are some other dental procedures which can cause or worsen tinnitus symptoms.
* Ultrasonic plaque removal
* Removal of impacted wisdom teeth
* TMJ
* Abscesses of the mouth
Tinnitus and Dentists
Not surprisingly, it is shown that a ridiculously high number of dentists in the word suffer from some kind of hearing loss in conjunction with tinnitus. This is related to what we discussed above about the dental drill. High-speed dental drills have been shown to cause or worsen tinnitus symptoms in an overwhelming majority of dentists who use them daily.
A small study found that dental practitioners experience tinnitus twice as often as other medical professionals. It is estimated that a very high percentage of dentists, anywhere from 30% to 100% do suffer or will suffer from some form of tinnitus later in their careers. It is said that having your head next to a gas-powered lawnmower while using a dental drill is the same as working all day.
The bottom line is that musicians and people who operate heavy machinery are not the only ones who are at risk of developing tinnitus due to their occupation. Most dental schools require that students wear ear protection while using dental drills.
Conclusion
When it comes to dentistry and tinnitus, things are a little tricky. Dental work can worsen the problem, but it is often necessary.
The UK dentistry market has experienced significant growth in recent years. Between 1999 and 2010, the market value increased by 90%. The market is estimated to be valued PS5.73 billion a year. In the UK there are 49,350 dental care professionals, and another 32.900 in general practice.
Your patients are your most valuable asset as a dentist. It's not just about bringing in new dental patients. It is important to understand the value each patient brings to your practice before you launch a dental marketing campaign. The total profit, delivered over time by those patients is what can break or make your dentistry business. If you want to keep a steady number of patients and grow your business, you need to know what makes them happy.
For instance, considerable portions of the Irish people are now opting to receive their cosmetic dental treatments abroad in countries such as Turkey, Spain, Portugal, and Eastern Europe. Some of these countries offer their patients discounts of up to 70 percent on what Dublin can offer. Perhaps these countries add more value to their dental patients, underlying the significance of why your practice needs to re-evaluate its marketing strategies.
Value of a New Dental Patient
The majority of dentistry practices channel a part of their overall marketing budgets to acquiring and locating new patients. The amount that should go towards attracting new patients will, of course, vary substantially from one dental clinic to another. It goes without saying that the dollars going into marketing efforts geared to attracting a new patient must not exceed that patient's lifetime value to the practice.
This makes calculating the value of a new patient a vital component in determining the most prudent way of allocating your marketing budget. However, marketing experts, have a widely ranging estimate when it comes to a new client's long-term value. Some have placed the estimates at just a couple of hundred dollars, while others place it well over $10,000.
A Wealthy Dentist survey that revealed that out of the 68 dentistry survey respondents, only a quarter had ever tried estimating the value of a new dental patient. Generally, the estimated value of new patients given by the respondents was in the range of $200 to $3,000, with per dental patient average of between $900 and $1,200.
Determining Patient Lifetime Value
To build meaningful dentist-patient relationships, you need to have an estimate of the lifetime value each dental patient brings. You can then structure and market your practice in a strategic way to maximize revenue and take your business to the next stage. The concept of Customer Lifetime Value or CLV is an estimation of the total value of a customer to a business during the entire period you have an engagement.
Customer Lifetime Value is a vital marketing tool for any business. It is especially important for businesses that are relationship driven, like dentistry. Among the factors to consider in estimating CLV for your particular clinic includes:
* Lifelong Relationship: Total duration that an average patient spends at your dentistry.
* Average Annual Value: Revenue made annually from each patient.
* Client Referral Value : The average number of patients referred by a client.
In calculating the lifetime value of an average patient, the following formula is useful:
Lifetime Patient Value = Lifelong Relationship x Average Annual Value + Client Referral Value
Importance of Patient Lifetime Value Calculation
Once you have an estimate of a new dental patient's lifetime value, it becomes possible to make decisions that are more informed in regard to advertising and marketing. You will certainly not want to spend more resources on acquiring new patients than what they bring to your dental practice in their lifetime.
You can also set a client target that you need to exceed when you know the current value of each new p
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