Sidekick - Summer 2012 - (Page 56)

Plan for More Digital Data It seems like every day, another piece of technology gets added to your digital practice. Electronic documents, cameras and imaging devices, digital radiography and cone-beam scanners all clamor for space on your computer network. How do you know how much server storage space you’ll need today, tomorrow, and three years down the line? Furthermore, are you confident that your data will be protected in the event of a server failure or catastrophe? Let’s start with the basics. If you’ve turned over a computer ad lately, you have some idea of the massive advances the PC industry has made in computer hard-drive storage. Years ago, disk drives could only hold megabytes and later, gigabytes. Now, terabyte drives are the norm. What does that mean to you and me? Well, an average practice using intraoral cameras and basic intraoral-only digital radiography generates around 20 gigabytes (GB) of data a year. That scenario would mean that today’s terabyte-capacity server would hold 50 years of images at today’s rate. If that’s truly the case, why is a new computer’s lifespan only three or four years? The simple answer isn’t so simple. Your practice is generating electronic data at a tremendous pace. Although intraoral pictures and X-rays only generate about 20 GB of files a year, your practice uses other systems that constantly add to your digital information. At TechCentral, we work with many dentists who are moving to paperless-office best practices. In these offices, there is usually a person who is punished—I mean responsible—for scanning any piece of relevant business paper that makes it through the door into the electronic record. TechCentral makes this job much easier with high-speed document scanners and storage systems. If your office manager cringes when the postman walks in, Tech Central’s solution can cut your time and effort with an efficient document-scanning solution. Depending on the scanner and settings used, scanned records can be as small as 150 KB, about the size of a large e-mail file, or as large as 10 MB per page, about the size of a highresolution photo. Ask yourself if you really need a full-color, high-resolution scan of that EOB form attached to the patient’s chart. Is it really even necessary to scan everything? That may be a different discussion, but when a document is scanned, make sure you are using the appropriate scanning settings for the information. In general, scan black-and-white documents at 100 dots per inch (dpi) and items with color pictures at 150 dpi. Only scan in color if truly necessary. Black-and-white files are the smallest by far, followed by grayscale files, then color documents. These settings vary from scanner to scanner, but poking around with the settings can be a huge space saver in the long run. BRIAN CALVERLEY TechCentral Field Operations Manager Are you confident that your data will be protected in the event of a server failure or catastrophe? Figure 1 When you add a new digital panoramic or cone-beam imaging machine, your data storage needs move to a whole new level. Digital pan images can be up to 15 MB each and cone-beam scans can easily be 10 times that size. If you capture these images for every patient in your practice over the next 18 months, make sure that your data server can handle the load. Remember that each piece of electronic information you capture adds to your data storage needs. It adds up quickly—a connected practice can easily generate over 100 GB of data per year. 56 sidekick | summer 2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Sidekick - Summer 2012

Sidekick - Summer 2012
Table of Contents
The Center for Pediatric Dentistry University of Washington
Digital Imaging Rocks the Rocky Mountains
Lake Shore Cosmetic Dentistry
TechCentral
Tools for Making Prudent Decisions
ProService
Privileges
Henry Schein Financial Services
An Inventory Solution That Gives Staff More Time for Patient Care
Unlocking Your Practice to Achieve Your Dreams
Plan for More Digital Data
McCabe Dental Clinic
Turn Your Payroll Into a Profit Center
Featured Designs
Professional Practice Transitions
Don’t Fail Your Next Exam

Sidekick - Summer 2012