NEVER Write Notes Again! How I Use AI for Awesome and Efficient Dental Records – PDP181

Jaz’s Introduction:
Oh, did I add this piece of information for Mrs. Smith’s appointment? Oh, I need to add to those notes for my 3. 30 appointment. Oh, and I need to go back and tidy up the notes for the other three patients. It’s like the worst thing ever being away from family and having that stress to make your notes awesome.

Hello, Protruserati. I’m Jaz Gulati, and I have two dreams in life. That’s it. Just two dreams. One is to never have to wash dishes ever again. At the moment, our kitchen is not big enough to accommodate a dishwasher, so that dream isn’t coming true anytime soon. But my second dream is to never have to write notes again. And I mean it, this is a serious dream of mine and it’s almost come true. And in this episode, I will reveal to you with my guest, Dr. Kevin Shannon, about this amazing way that Kevin has come up with for the notes to write themselves.

Let me say it again, notes that write themselves, you don’t need to stress and stay away from family and have insufficient notes or feel rushed doing notes because they’re not only going to be awesome notes, but with the use of AI and clever technology made our notes more efficient.

So in today’s episode I’ll actually unpack Kevin’s journey, he’s actually a dentist who’s no longer practising clinical anymore, and I asked him his motivation, why did he develop this software, what was his why, and it reminded me of the film Law Abiding Citizen. If you haven’t seen this film, a little bit of a spoiler coming as well.

It’s basically Gerard Butler, he’s a cool guy, he’s a family guy, and unfortunately his family get murdered. And essentially he’s been framed and the legal system is letting him down. So what he does then, he takes everything into his own hands and seeks his sweet revenge. And it’s actually a pretty good film.

But what Kevin’s doing is he’s kind of like the law abiding dentist. He kind of got screwed over and what I love about him is that he admitted that, you know what, his notes could have been better. And so now he is relentlessly pursuing ways that we can make our notes better, faster, and in a way that we don’t have to type much ever again.

I know it sounds too good to be true, but this is well worth a listen. If the pain of writing notes, or whichever software you may be using to help you, is too great like it was for me. So this episode and the content we made today has a real chance to actually be life changing in a way, to actually free up more time for your family, for your loved ones, for your hobbies, by really taking out the stress and the time away from writing your notes.

You’ll hear about the system and its motivations and how to actually use the product in this podcast. But essentially, it uses the power of AI and your voice recording using a microphone to give you the perfect notes, which are contemporaneous and accurate and efficient. And Protruserati, I am absolutely in love.

Dental Pearl
Which is why today’s Protrusive Dental Pearl is to sign up for a free trial of this product. It’s basically a website that you go to and you link your microphone, and you’ll listen later in terms of how we recommend getting started with improving your notes through the power of voice. But to accompany this pearl, I’ll also be adding a video.

Adding a video to Protrusive Guidance and to YouTube to give you a guide on which microphones I’ve tried and actually give you a demo of this product called Digital TCO. To take advantage of this secret page that we’ve made within Digital TCO to give you an extended trial and 50 percent off head to protrusive.co.uk/notes, that’s protrusive.co.uk/notes and the main episode you’ll hear in another link actually leads to the same place. Essentially, it’s our own community having a special offer, which unlocks Jaz Mode. And what Jaz Mode is basically something that Kevin’s been developing just for me to help my second dream come alive.

Because initially the product was like, okay, how can we use our voice commands at the end of an appointment to make your notes? Awesome. So instead of at the end of appointment, typing away, you’re just dictating and it uses clever AI to make your notes, which sounds great, but what I want is Jaz Mode and Jaz Mode is basically the microphone is on and I’m speaking to my patient and I’m explaining and diagnosing and reporting back to my nurse and using that recording of our chat, of our consultation, plus the nurse’s input.

Plus the AI, it actually generates the whole notes for me. And this is very much in the beta phase, but it’s called Jaz Mode. And I’m really thankful for Kevin to naming after me, but if you want to be able to unlock Jaz Mode and play around with it and really experience what all this is about, why am I so passionate about this today?

Just head over to protrusive.co.uk/notes, and also watch out for the video to actually show you a demo of how all this works and which microphone I recommend for it. Now let’s go ahead and join the main episode and I’ll catch you in the outro. I promise you, you might want to put your onions down for this one. This episode might actually save you a lot of time and money to enjoy your life in the way that you want instead of having to labor over your notes.

Main Episode:
Dr. Kevin Shannon, it is a great pleasure to welcome you to the Protrusive Journal podcast today. How are you?

[Kevin]
Yeah, I’m good, Jas. How are you doing?

[Jaz]
Absolutely brilliant. Recently, I don’t know if I told you this joke I made. So recently I was at the AI day in ACE in Stanmore. And essentially what we did, we did the live patient examination. And so someone called Dr. Rahul Shah, he did the traditional exam and he was using a software for note taking.

And just generally how he does is, iTero scanning photos and live unseen case discussion. And so I was blinded. I was in the Costa coffee and not seeing any of this. So then it came to my turn. And my job was to do the exact same examination in the way I do it, except now I’m using AI. So any AI in the iTero scanner, AI in terms of your software, which I’m really excited to talk about.

I had a couple of note taking softwares, yours and another as well. And I used a Pearl for the first time, which is like a radiographs and stuff. And then the patient got these two reports, one letter and report and tools from Dr. Shah and one from me with all my AI goodness and how much more efficient it was when I sent mine, but also how much more the patient actually liked the AI benefited one.

So AI is huge, massive game changer in every facet of our lives, but I’m excited to talk about dentistry. And Kevin, for me, you are a problem solver. You are a big time problem solver. I’m so excited to share what you’ve created so far with the Protruserati. Problem solvers are much needed in dentistry.

And the biggest problem that we have is notes, taking notes, record keeping. You might’ve heard me say this as well. My two dreams in life. One is never to wash dishes ever again. That’s number one. I don’t have a dishwasher yet. And number two is not to have to write notes ever again. And you are the man who’s helping my second dream come alive. All right.

So I didn’t know where to begin. Like, you’re a clinical dentist, not practicing anymore. You’re pouring all your time and energy into Digital TCO. Just tell us your background. how did this all evolve? It’s absolutely fascinating.

[Kevin]
Well, thanks Jaz. That’s great introduction. Yeah, well, I’m a dentist from Glasgow in Scotland. I studied up in Dundee and then I’ve been doing dentistry for the past 10 years and I feel like I’ve got quite good at dentistry. I’ve got a complete obsession with efficiency. Everywhere I’ve been, the bin gets moved to the most efficient place so the nurse can just chuck all the stuff in the bin. It’s sometimes it gets to becoming a problem, to be honest.

[Jaz]
This is you as an associate, not, or have you owned a practice as well?

[Kevin]
No, I’ve owned a practice. It was kind of getting to that point really of what am I going to do here? Because I don’t really take well to be told what to do. It’s well, but it’s just part of it. I’ve got strong opinions, strong ideas on things, and I like to be able to move quick and fast, and sometimes get slowed. Anyway, my own problems.

[Jaz]
I could just vouch for this already. I know, I’d love to hear more about your journey, but I just want to just butt in here, and say that working with you over the last few weeks has been absolutely amazing. Like you’ll email me at like past midnight and I’ll wake up. And the first thing I see is like, I’ve cracked the code for this enhancement within your amazing software. Then we’ll talk about that later. And so I can see that you’re like me, you’re a bit of a workaholic and you are a very determined person. And that’s definitely a feature and an efficiency. I totally get it. It makes sense so far in terms of your persona.

[Kevin]
Yeah. Well, that’s essentially it. I’ve worked in a few different jobs, Bashing the NHS, then mixed practice, private practices back to a mixed practice again, and I just had like a bit last year, I just had a bit of an interesting year with some patients.

I was really enjoying the job, the practice I was in, the people that I was working with. Then these patients came along and they just created this big complaint. They had nothing to complain about. They knew exactly what they were doing. The indemnity told me that they’ve done it round about all these other practices.

[Jaz]
So it’s a proper ambulance chases.

[Kevin]
Yeah, and me being I’m like, after I heard that, I was like that, well the buck stops with me. I’m not having them going about doing this to anybody else, which then it was a waste of time. It just created a big old fight back and forward with them. I’ve got about 70 A4 pages of complaints from them on their side to me.

[Jaz]
Wow.

[Kevin]
And I still say that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the treatment and at the end of the day they win because they know what they’re doing and they’ve picked through all the notes and things, all the threats. So with that, I was like, if my notes, because at the end of the day, my notes were not good enough.

My notes, my consent process, it’s not good enough. If it had been, I would have been able to go, look, here’s what I’ve given to you, here’s what I’ve written down and said to you. And they would have had to go away, but because of my own laziness and discretions and not just not being able to do it to the best of my ability, it caused me a big headache. So I decided I’m going to try and do something about that, which I’ve tried to do, and I love it.

[Jaz]
I can tell that. But firstly, just let’s take a moment, everyone, just to appreciate what you’ve said there. And kudos to you for being vulnerable and sharing your story. I didn’t know this. And also the fact that you’re man enough to admit that, you know what, the notes, although your treatment was good.

We all fall back to our notes. Ultimately, our notes are our saving grace. They are everything. And I think it’s really good of you to make that admission. And I feel like I’m getting vibes of that film Law Abiding Citizen. It’s like, I think it’s Gerard Butler. Like, you’re this man on a mission.

You’re like, going to destroy the world to create this perfect note taking system. And mate, I’m going to take complete advantage of this because you are solving my problem. So look, whatever, man. If it’s emotionally generated, like this rage that you have inside this desire that you have inside, I don’t care what emotion it is, you’re pouring into the right area.

And I am so, I mean, I’ve been loving using your product so far, but I know that this is a work in progress. So my next question really is when you decided that you wanted to change your purpose and now pour everything in to helping dentists around the world to make notes, seamless, better, efficient, all of those things, basically, which we’ll talk about today, assisted by AI. And you realize that, from what I understand, you’re developing this yourself. Have you got a team? Like where did you develop the skills to even do this? Have you always been tech savvy?

[Kevin]
I’ve always liked computers and technology and things, high school to making websites, making music on the computer. I’ve always been able to use a computer, but really I just have learned this as I’ve gone along, but I just I just looked into like product development. How do you go about developing a product? How and looking at things like Airbnb and all these other kind of companies and how they started off with just building the most basic simple thing the minimum viable product they could possibly make.

So that’s what I did I built that the simple thing first of all something that always annoyed me was consent forms, having to get different bits and paste it all together, and I was, my thinking is if you are using a computer and you’re doing a repetitive action, the computer should do it for you.

So I thought, well, let’s see if I can make something like that, so I made a little thing which is separate buttons, you click that for an implant, you click that for a denture, you click that, and it’ll put it all together into the one big form. So then after that, then I just thought, okay, well, what can I do next? So I just started trying to add other features and other features. And then I just kind of made this feature as a bit of a joke. And it’s, in my opinion, completely game changing.

[Jaz]
It’s no joke for sure anymore. This is getting really serious. And the story you’re telling is very much something I’m going through a little bit at the moment. We are creating a mentorship platform. So another problem that dentists have is when you have a tough case, you have some questions and you really want to just sit down. down with another dentist who has a lot more experience than you and just go over like zoom, for example, and show x rays and just make sure your blind spots uncovered and you’re not missing anything out.

And you get this amazing advice and that’s a mentorship as a future, but to find those mentors is difficult. So we’re having meetings with developers, we’re creating this MVP, this minimal viable product for Intaglio, our mentorship. But the problem that I think that you are solving with Digital TCO, the name of your product is writing notes and actually eliminating the whole writing and typing, which is why I’m so fascinated.

I absolutely hate typing a big time and my nurse has to bless us. Zoe has to really tap me Jaz. Have you done any notes at Jaz? Have you done any notes yet? And no matter what template you use, like templates are, we’ll talk about templates and why they have a downfall. And you really poured everything into so far.

Why do you think the existing way, which is if you have a patient like a new patient and you have your new patient template, like it’s written text and you have to go back and delete stuff and add stuff. Why was that not good enough for you? And I’m so glad it wasn’t. But why? Why do you think that’s not going to help us to overcome those issues that you face? And we’re all going to face about when the proverbial hits the fan that our notes are awesome.

[Kevin]
Well, there’s a couple of things in behind that. I think the first thing to start with it was a really good article in the BDJ, British Dental Journal, by Kevin Lewis and he discussed about some cases with the General Dental Council where people had ended up in front of the General Dental Council and they got in trouble because they hadn’t written enough notes and there was another case where they’d written too many notes and the GDC said there’s no way you’ve been able to write this so it’s obviously a lot of rubbish.

So, what are you meant to do? And that’s the thing with templates, that’s the first thing really, is that it’s just a copy paste, most of the time with some slight changes. Which, from the regulatory point of view, is the problem. From my point of view, this repetitive action, you’re just, first of all, without any of the other systems, if you’ve got a written out template, you’re having to go in and highlight and delete things out, it’s okay if your nurse is doing that, but then at the end you’re going to have to come along anyway and type out a lot of different stuff.

It’s inefficient. Other systems that exist have improved upon that, but it’s all still within a similar bubble, I think, where it’s just a different way to adjust the template. The other issue with that is, is that you have to create and adjust all the templates, so it’s not so easy to change things when there’s patient specific situations or when things occur that you don’t have a template for.

You’re back to stage one, you might as well just get a pen and paper out and write it all out. So, yeah, that’s really what I kind of, it’s, what it is, is that you have to, the dentist has to conform to the software that’s provided to them, rather than the software conforming to how the dentist wants to work.

And I think that’s kind of the big benefit of me doing this, is because I’ve worked as a dentist, I know how you want to, how you want things to be in a sense of what you want is you don’t want to do anything.

[Jaz]
Well, I’ve taken this to the extreme and we’ll talk about how in your journey, I’ve helped to mold it to create Jaz Mode. And we’ll talk about Jaz Mode later in terms of my own selfish needs, but it is to solve a bigger problem. I love that you’re such a great listener and you’re so engaged in this. One thing that no one ever talks about Kevin is with our templates. There are often things in there. For example, every composite restoration I have, there is a template I have, it’s called A2 composite Jaz, right?

So type it in. It’s got choose your nurse name, delete the other one. And articaine or lidocaine delete, whichever one you need to delete, basically. And there’s a bit in there where it says warned re root canal risk. It’s just there, right? Because I expect to do it. But what if the one day that I forget like I’m having a conversation. I don’t do it, but it’s actually in the notes like there’s something in the notes, which actually didn’t happen, which we don’t talk about. No one actually addresses this issue that there are some things in there which we should be discussing, but it’s not in there.

So sometimes the templates mean that your template is actually better than the conversation that you had. And there’s a danger in that as well. Obviously, if the template’s really weak and doesn’t cover all the conversation, there isn’t danger on the flip side. So, how does a Digital TCO, and there are some other ones that I’ve tried, and so, oh, sorry, the joke right at the beginning, I was supposed to tell you the joke I actually made at that day when I was lecturing to everyone and we did a live performance of your software is I think the biggest feat of AI so far is to understand your lovely Glaswegian accent.

Like it was amazing. Like you showed this video, I played your video of the super dentist cheat mode, everyone. And here’s your lovely, beautiful Glaswegian accent. And AI just aced it. I was like, wow, this guy, how did you, was there a special box that you had to unlock for this?

[Kevin]
Yeah, I’ve had to play about with it quite a bit, but because of that, it works for anyone really. And not only that, you can be a reasonable distance away. There can be banging going on in the background, nurses opening. I was down with a dentist in Nottingham. It was the last week of the week before, just with them live.

That’s one of the disadvantages of me not practicing anymore as I can test it out live but you’ve been helping me with that and doing these things has helped as well but you know we’re testing it and the nurse is banging around putting all this stuff away and it still it still works it still gets it. So yeah.

[Jaz]
There is, if listen if you’re worried about your accent don’t worry it’ll be fine I think Digital TCO can handle it based on what i’ve seen so far.

[Kevin]
Yeah you can handle it and I’ve really given a good bashing as well with going really quick and lots of ums and ahs and it gets it.

[Jaz]
So just tell us, look, most people listening, watching right now haven’t heard of a Digital TCO. It’s very much a new thing that you’re developing. You’re point everything into it. I’ve been testing it as well and I’m giving you lots of feedback, lots of people giving you feedback. I think what you’ve created is, is got such great potential.

And actually, it’s helped me a lot. Like the other day I had an emergency patient, so sometimes in emergencies you can’t have a template to reflect because every emergency is unique in the same way that a new patient, a lot of things you can use a template totally. But when it comes to treat and plan recommendation, you still need to put your fingers to a keyboard and type in the bespoke treatment plan, right?

So the technology that you develop uses your voice and a microphone to develop the notes essentially. And I’ll let you explain it in a more beautiful way in terms of exactly what your hope was and how it works. But this emergency patient I kind of cheated your system, your software. I will let you explain how it’s supposed to be used, but essentially, I just put the microphone on, I recorded the entire conversation with the dentist, I plugged in the transcript that it generated into super dentist cheat mode, and it just instantly formed me the beautiful notes.

So the diagnosis was sinusitis, causing pain of the upper right posterior maxillary teeth. Okay. And we did all the tests and I’ve got the patient to go down and it made his pain pain worse at the postural position and it just noted everything beautifully. I showed Zoe. I was like, Zoe, look at this. We don’t have to type anything.

The notes are made in such a unique, strange diagnosis that we don’t make about once or twice a year, a sinusitis. So I was amazed by that. So that’s why we’re developing Jaz Mode. But let’s go back to actually the roots. How is digital TCO supposed to be used? How can it help to enhance the dentist’s day to day workflow?

[Kevin]
Okay. So, the main thing which, if anybody gives it a try, is the first thing you really want to dive into is Super Dentist Cheat Mode. And how that works is basically you just tell it what you did. It’s not connected to any templates, it has its own knowledge of dentistry. So you just would speak what happened.

So, patient attended, they had a fractured upper right six. They said it’s sensitive to cold, keeping them awake at night. No changes medically. Had a look at the tooth, it’s mesial buccal cusps fractured off. There’s an M. O. D. amalgam which is large, there’s caries present, we took a periapical radiograph.

It shows there’s deep caries into the pulp and there’s pathology, it’s tender to percussion. Discuss with the patient the options, etc, etc, etc. You just go through and you just speak out what happened, and then you hit generate the note. And what it’ll do is, is it’ll just take that speech and it’ll format it into a lovely, a lovely big note.

It’s as simple as that. Some of the comments that I’ve been getting from people is, it seems too good to be true, but like, it’s honestly, that’s how it works, essentially. Attached to that, there’s the other sections, which work similarly, like for examinations and treatments, but with those, you’re obviously kind of following a protocol, generally.

So instead of having to just constantly speak things out, you can set up a template underneath that. But it’s not like templates before, it’s more just a brief written out, just how you do your composite. And then all you have to do is tell it any deviations from your protocol or any deviations from a healthy patient baseline, essentially.

So, if you’re doing an examination, someone comes in and they’ve just got a bit of Perio 3 on the lower anteriors, then all you would need to do, if that was it, they had no complaints, nothing else, all you would have to do is tell it BPE 000/030. Advise them to go see a hygienist for full periodontal charting.

[Jaz]
Warned about recession risk and smoking cessation advice given At the moment it’s on 20, that kind of stuff.

[Kevin]
Yeah, and then you could hit the button and then it would still give you the full examination note with all the correct information slotted into place. You’ve not had to type anything.

[Jaz]
So what you taught me there was that the way the template is set up within these exam and consult modes within digital TCO is it assumes that everything’s like the most boring patient ever, and you just add to it the deviation.

So for example, so my template at the moment has got Articaine and Lidocaine in there, but 99 percent of the time I’m using Articane, but 99 percent of the time, so I would put articaine, but then if I, only when I change it, I would then say, oh, I use Lidocaine not Articaine, and then it would change that because 99 percent of it is the rest of the same, right?

[Kevin]
Yeah. So it would just automatically change it and then put it into what’s going on. Yeah. The way I imagine it is, it’s a patient who comes in, you do the examination, they don’t need any treatment, you send them away, you see them in six months. That you just need to tell it any differences from that essentially.

So it makes it really efficient because you’re not having to go through and repeat all the same things over and over again, extra oral, check the lips, check this, check that. And then it also helps with that problem that you were talking about where you have things that you didn’t do. So for instance, if I was doing a filling, I wouldn’t have, I wouldn’t even put the deep line in.

I would just tell that after, okay, the upper right six was deep, advise the patient that might need root canal treatment or extraction. And then it will slot that in. And usually it’ll expand on that as well.

[Jaz]
Yeah. And then I’ve seen it expand and actually give the data, which we would do now with the way I’ve been perversing your system and really going to the next level is sometimes all the stuff is standard.

And at the end, what you could do is what I’ve done so far. And again, this is an experimentation mode and we’ll talk about Jaz Mode moment is if the microphone’s on, and I’ve told my patient, and by the way I’m recording, it helps me to generate my notes. Patients are totally cool with it. And I’m just telling them the treatment plan, I’m telling them, I’m warning them of the risks all over again.

It’s like, okay, by the way, the next appointment, you’ve got really bad decay. Some of these are close to your nerve. I can’t really tell you exactly what the chance are, but, one in ten may need a root canal treatment. Do you know what that is? And I’m having that conversation, and it’s picking it all up.

And it’s really wonderful because I’m not having to repeat it twice. I’m just saying it to a patient and it’s adding it. It’s a bit like when you go to hospitals, the consultants, they don’t type, they have a dictation, which a secretary somewhere is getting paid to type out for them, except now this is your secretary.

And to what people haven’t realized yet, cause you haven’t mentioned it is where your nurse typically should be helping you with your notes, right? They still have a section within your software to add a few bits and bobs. So it’s not just your template. Your boring template. It’s your template, plus the nurse’s input, plus your voice, and the AI basically mashes it together to create what is the perfect bespoke notes. Is that right?

[Kevin]
Yeah, so the nurse could type away as you’re doing it. That was the way that I could think about getting the most efficient. Like you said, how you’re using it, which is completely game changing. Like, I think what it does at the moment is, it does it really well, and that’s to fit into how most dentists are going to work.

Which is, you’re going to see the patient, and then you’re going to go do your notes. But I’m really glad that you said that about the microphone. and that patients don’t mind because I think a lot of dentists may have a bit of a worry oh what’s this patients are going to not like this and if you just ask for consent and they give it you’ve got it recorded as well it’s as simple as just asking like you said. But yeah so that’s the way that it generally works. So the Jaz Mode it works a little bit differently than the other systems there. That’s the work the way that you want it to work, which is you don’t have to really do anything, because still with the system.

[Jaz]
The laziest dentist ever.

[Kevin]
Yeah, yeah, well, but that’s it. That’s the thing about this is I’m not making it for me. I’m not a software developer, I’m a dentist who can do this. So that’s it. That’s what I want. I want to build this for dentists and that’s where all the extra features and why it’s getting good is because anytime something tells me can it do this, I go yes, I just go and figure out how to tell to make it happen So yeah at the moment with those others the original systems you’d see the patient you go over and you do the notes and it’s going to save you so much time.

Jaz Mode which is in a kind of beta at the moment because it’s getting there. It’s not quite perfect yet, it’s just you record the full appointment and then it’ll pick through all of that. I think at the moment we can get up to about an hour and a half to maybe an hour and 45 minutes of appointment recorded which is a massive transcript. And it will pick through it and slot it all into the notes.

[Jaz]
I mean, just to touch on this, please, if you don’t mind, everyone’s thinking, why would I need to do one hour 45? You’re totally right. If you’re doing implants, doing a full arch implant, you’re doing the surgery. There’s nothing much being spoken there. You wouldn’t do it for that.

It’s for example, I do TMD consults, which are 75 minutes, right? Some people might have in niches where they do a 90 minute consultation, discussion, anxious patient, whatever. For most of us and new patient examinations, half an hour, 40 minutes, an hour if you’re in a fancier practice, and that covers all bases.

And that entire discussion is what I want. So at the moment, I’m using it for new patients and TMD consults religiously. And I’ve been testing in the recall examination as well, emergency patients, and I’m having a lot of fun. I’m feeding back to you as well. But essentially, my dream is to just record the entire conversation with my patient. And then my nurse’s input, plus the template. Do you see the template playing a role in this now as well?

[Kevin]
Yeah, the way I would imagine this working is that you put the microphone on, you hit record, then at the nurse can also have their input box so they can type things in if they want, then what happens at the end of the appointment is you pick, if you pick what happens, do you want to then put this through cheat mode?

Do you want to put it through your TMD consultation? Was that an implant consultation? Because maybe the patient’s been booked in for an implant consultation, but it ends up being about Invisalign, or things change, you want it to be adaptable afterwards. So, record it. Pick what you want to apply it to cheat mode, which is just freeform.

It’ll just write you a note or connect it to some sort of examination template and then just get it to spit you out a note. What I see happening after that though is, is it just going into it. Because like I said, if you’re having to do something repetitive, the computer should be able to do it for you.

This doesn’t exist yet, but it’s kind of what, where this is really going is then from that, it’ll be, at the moment you get patient letters and things automatically generated as well. It’s like covering letters of where it breaks down what you spoke about in the examinations.

[Jaz]
So this is, again, I’m very excited about this because it takes me a while to assemble letters because based on, I go back and I sometimes listen, I use DAN for my audio recording, I listen to it, I then pick out key bits, look at the transcript and I kind of autofill, not autofill, I’m actually manually deciding based on a previous letter I’ve written, I’m changing bits and bobs.

So at the moment I’ve seen it on Digital TCO. Once I’ve got my notes, it is a button to generate a letter and that is really nice, but is there a way for me to, and probably you’re going to say yes in the future, it’s going to happen, is have my letter template used?

[Kevin]
Yes, I was actually just speaking to someone about this yesterday. So it does do consent forms, the thing I was talking about earlier on where you click all the buttons and you can add in patient specific information with your voice as well. But yeah, that’s the next thing after we get Jaz Mode just tightened up a little bit. I’m going to do the letter section. And all of this, because at the moment there’s patient letters and automatic referral letters and referral reply letters, so if someone refers someone to you for a TMD consult, you can click the button and it’ll send the letter back.

Oh my god. It’ll create the letter back to the dentist. But I think really where it’s all going is all these things are all just kind of coming together until it’s going to be. You record the appointment, it’ll give you the note, it’ll give you the patient letter, it’ll do your charting, it’ll connect up with your scans, x rays, photos, just get to a point where it’s like the one ring to rule them all, so that you really don’t have to do anything. And there’s no reason why that that can’t happen, apart from someone making it essentially.

[Jaz]
But my advice to you, and this is like I’m happy to say this on air to you, is my advice to you is what you have is very exciting, but as someone and my own selfish needs, I don’t want you to expand too quick, make your core product just amazing, and I see daily improvements and whatnot, which is amazing, which takes us to the bit in terms of our collaboration.

You very kindly said that, okay, we can get the Protruserati on board, and there are some perks. They get the people who listen to podcasts, as you’ve seen on Protrusive Guidance, very geeky. Very nice. Hardworking dentists. And we all have the same dream of not not writing notes. And so what I said is, look, can you do some sort of extended free trial and some sort of discount in the hope that the way that they will reciprocate your discount is they’ll give you feedback and help you and help you.

This community will help you. But they also get the sort of reduced rate as well. So can you just tell us about what you’ve got in store after this podcast will obviously make it launched and available to the Protruserati. But how can we have this symbiotic relationship of people supporting you and your product to make it the best it can be, but also then getting a really good deal that’s kind of locked in as you told me.

[Kevin]
So anyone who signs up, I’ve given Jaz a link. Jaz, I’ll tell you what the link is. If you sign up via that link, you’ll get 28 days completely free. So a month free just to try it out and really push it and test it to its limits. Like try and break it. That’s what I want. I want you to make it not work, right?

Because that’s how it’s going to improve. I mean, it does work. And so you might struggle a bit unless you’re Jaz, extreme innovator, giving a really good hammering, but that’s what’s pushing it forward.

[Jaz]
And just on that, I would say if someone’s thinking of giving this a go, don’t just be like, oh, Jaz podcast. Let me just quickly sign up for now. And then burn through 28 days. You know what the next thing I’m going to make Kevin is that remember I told you I had, I’ve experimented even with the microphones and whatnot. And so I’m going to make a guide for everyone. Like, look, ideally, if you’re going to take this seriously, let’s get some good kit, get a decent microphone because the microphone I have is so good that even the noise of the suction is like blanked out.

Like it’s amazing. And I’ve seen a difference in terms of the microphone in the corner of the surgery picks it up okay. But the microphone, my microphone on my sort of a pocket is phenomenal. And the quality of the AI can only be improved by the quality of the data you input into it.

So I would say before you sign up for this, make sure you have that pep talk with your nurse and say, look, we’re using this thing. It’s very exciting. Let’s do the same things that we usually do, except we’re also going to hit record. Just remember to hit record and put the patient initials. And we’re doing this like an experimentation, but make sure you have everything set up to go. So you can really give it a good bash.

[Kevin]
And then obviously you need to get some sort of microphone as well, if you’re going to put a guide together. But the way I’ve made this as well, it’s made that it should work. With whatever you’ve got, especially for the features that are there. The Jaz Mode, it doesn’t need a good mic.

Like, you definitely need a good mic. They have these cheap ones on there, but they just break. They’re not any good. You need to go for something good. And I’ve got a WhatsApp, I’ll give you my phone number so you can WhatsApp me when you’re using it. It may just be too much and I may have to.

[Jaz]
We might just create a section within Protrusive Guidance, right? For everyone just to collate and talk and discuss and feedback rather than see your phone’s not ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, because I’m with the Protruserati all over the world. You get like dentists from Mauritius and Taiwan messaging you at random hours and stuff. So maybe a Protrusive Guidance space might be the best way.

[Kevin]
Yeah, possibly. Yeah, maybe I don’t need to annoy my partner with that ding, ding, ding going on at three o’clock in the morning. Yeah, and just anything, just put it in there. Comments, suggestions, the good, the bad, the ugly. Because if it’s something that bothers you, it’ll bother someone else.

So that’s the way that this is going to really just keep pushing into the future. And then after that, for signing up and helping me build this essentially, I’ll give you 50 percent off of the course for life.

[Jaz]
It’s like locked in, so, and when you find out, okay, that’s not right for you anymore, then fine. But when you come back, you’ve got to pay the full price. It’s a bit of a steal in terms of what it’s at and it’s tax deductible, which is amazing. And it feels, it If you’re going to take, I mean, how much is our time worth day by day time with family, time with your kids, time with your loved ones and who wants to be in front of a laptop at the end of the day?

And so many of our colleagues, colleagues do this, right? At the end of the day, I get messages all the time saying I finished my day at five and I don’t get home till half seven because I’m there at the practice hour and a half just going through all my notes, water tightening them. So this is you. And you are happy to go through this little period of discomfort because growth only happens when you go through discomfort.

If you want your notes to be amazing and you’re going to have to make some sort of massive change, it’s a bit like getting started with dental photography. I don’t know what percentage of dentists are using dental photography. I feel like it’s getting more and more, but a lot of dentists still don’t because the barrier to actually takes effort to think about which camera to buy.

So a lot of people just to know that you have to buy a new microphone or a microphone, they’re not going to do it. It’s not going to happen for them. And so for them, their pain is not enough. So really the person, the Protruserati is for is if you, like me, have a massive pain area in your life of dental notes.

And if this is something that you really want to improve significantly and be efficient and be part of something quite special here with Digital TCO and what you’re setting up and being like a founding member and to get this right, but also to be able to say that in the future, oh yeah, this awesome software five years from now, six months from now, I think is, I was part of the initial beta team to help it become.

And I gave Kevin this idea to do that, and you’ve been amazing with me with that. So thank you so much. But I’m excited for everyone to try and use it, abuse it, break it, and to really make something so we never have to type again.

[Kevin]
Yeah, that’s totally the thing. And yeah, like the hurdles to using it are pretty low. Like you say, it’s really about getting a microphone and plugging it in because I know what we’re like as dentists, we’re particular. We all work in our particular ways and we like our things to be certain ways and everybody works a bit differently. So it’s made with that in mind. It’s made and-

[Jaz]
I agree and I disagree. I agree that the hurdle is low because it’s a microphone. It’s also a mindset shift and also be willing to cock up a few times. That’s what I’m suggesting, what I’ve experienced so far is I gave Zoe the pep talk and Zoe hates it. It’s like, okay, Zoe, I need to talk to you. It’s like, what now?

What new tool, what new software, what new thing have you found now? She gives me that, the eye rolling stuff. And once you get past that, like, okay, so this is the login. This is how you log in. This is the website to go. I’ve already saved my login there for you. This is what we do for checkups.

So you need to have that half an hour time to explain what you’re doing and why you are doing it. Okay. To make notes, awesome. And she’s noticed a change in me. So Jaz, you’re really taking your notes seriously nowadays, aren’t you? I’m like, yes, I really want this to work and be amazing. And so what we’re doing at the moment is we’re doing. S. O. E. Software of excellence that we use so far.

We’re still doing the things normally, i.e. She’s still working on my template, right? So we’re still working my template as I’m doing my checkup, my team, the console, whatever. But just before we start the patient, I’m also clicking record on Digital T. C. O.

I’m essentially doing Jaz Mode, right? I’m breaking it. I’m using it, but I’m loving where the direction is going in. So as we’re doing Jaz Mode, we’re also doing it the conventional way. And at the end, once Zoe’s finished with editing the template, we’re then feeding that into Digital TCO and we’re kind of experimenting.

And so far I’ve been very impressed. There’s been a few instances where perhaps we forgot to hit record or whatever, but this is a learning process. So I agreed that yes, microphone, but also there is a bit of a cost to pay in terms of a mindset shift and change of behavior. Changing behaviors is often the most difficult thing to do.

A new habit. So this habit of starting up a new web page and clicking record, it sounds easy, but it’s just, it takes a bit of a dedication.

Interjection:
Hi guys, it’s Jaz with this Interference. Do you remember when the first ever Protrusive Dental Pearls I gave you? Way back in like 2019. And this was quite simply to know and not to do is not to know. What that means is you can have all this extra information in your life, but if you don’t act upon it, it’s as good as not knowing it in the first place. So if you’re now curious about what this is all about, and you want to leverage the use of voice to improve the quality and efficiency of your note taking, don’t forget to go to protrusive.co.uk/notes to see what all the fuss is about.

This is an affiliate agreement I have with Kevin, and the benefit of that is that you get a locked in price an extended free trial, but you must be willing to give feedback. You must be willing to have like a group project as Petrus Rati to help make this software become the next big thing in dentistry.

I tell you, it’s been absolutely amazing working with Kevin so far. This is what he does full time now. His entire mission, raison d’etre, is to make Digital TCO awesome and to help my second dream come alive. So we never have to write notes ever again. So if you’re excited, I am. Dive in, get started, but remember, to help make it awesome we need your help, which is why you’re getting the subsidized rate as part of being a Protruserati. Let’s catch the rest of this episode and I’ll see you in the outro.

[Kevin]
Yeah, especially for the Jaz Mode. A couple of times with the superdetective cheat mode and you’ll be like that, how have I lived without this thing? Yeah. Cause that’s it. I had someone messaging me this morning. Oh, it’s not doing this.

And they had a problem with their microphone, but the panic that they were sending me over 10 minutes and it was just a microphone problem. And I was like, I feel bad for them, but I was also like, that’s quite a good thing to have made, I think.

[Jaz]
Brilliant. I mean, people already being so dependent on it is, that sounds fantastic. So I would say if you’re going to do it, I mean the website, I’ll go over it again, is digitaltco.co.uk/protrusive to be included in the offer. But essentially, the way to use it is make sure you’re all set up. You’ve had this pep talk with your nurse. You’ve got a microphone. And again, I’ll make a little video on YouTube and on Protrusive Guidance about which ones I’ve experimented with so far and which ones I would recommend.

And again, if you buy it, it’s tax deductible because you’re using it for your clinical dentistry or live in the practice. And so all these things are tax deductible, including the subscription. So when you get all this stuff, you set up. I would suggest you don’t go for Jaz Mode straight away. You use it how Kevin intended to use it in the beginning, which is basically you plug your template in and then the nurse inputs it.

And at the end you just say, oh, everything went to plan. But instead of using my usual matrix, I use this matrix and we got a good contact. However, the shape of it was a bit deficient, whatever, right? You do it that way. And then it copy and paste it onto your usual software. Then also experiment with the super dentist cheat mode and you’ll be blown away. And then eventually when you’re feeling a bit more confident, you got your microphone working well. Then try Jaz Mode, basically, and then thank me later.

[Kevin]
Yes, that sounds like a reasonable pathway plan.

[Jaz]
Amazing. Let’s talk about AI. Any other exciting things on the horizon in terms of AI and dentistry? Where do you feel it’s going to go?

[Kevin]
Well, I think it’s really just going to overhaul the whole entire admin stuff. I’ve not had to play with the things like peril and that yet, but that just looks amazing to me. There’s nothing really stopping it from being able to do this.

You’ve been able to take photographs and it given you a chart like photographs and a scan and an audio recorded note with x-rays. That should be enough to give you everything that you need to generate for a patient. So from her perspective, in the surgery, I think that that’s the way that it’ll be going.

Scanning every patient, photographing every patient, AI generating. All the information and keeping the pay and it keeps the patient more informed really as well because it’ll be connected with our emails and more text messages and just, I think that’s what’s going to happen.

[Jaz]
A truly integrated experience where it’s the wow factor when you do these things with AI. I mean, a pearl has a wow factor when it really highlights, because when you show them the radiolucencies and radiograph, they don’t see it. Sometimes it’s so subtle that we haven’t got the trained eye, but when it’s colored in blue, it’s something else. We’d like to have Pearl do it. So yeah, Pearl was great when we used her on the AI day.

Patients really appreciate that extra layer of communication. And for me, like what you’re doing with Digital TCO is quality notes, but also saving you time, man. It’s all about saving you time and efficiency. And so just like you said, there are other ways we see AI developing into, to create a better experience for patients, but also just efficiency no longer upper right six mod amalgam upper right five zero composite. A computer can do that for you.

[Kevin]
Yeah. I mean, it should be able to do it from the photographs again, all of these things. The only thing that’s stopping it from happening is just people building it now, because the fundamentals all exist. I see some things on Facebook, and they go AI is coming, but it’s not going to take over everything yet.

I really don’t think that that’s the case. I really think that it’s just a matter of time now for the people just to build these things. It really blows my mind what it can do if you dive, when you start diving in and looking at this kind of stuff. I think as well what would be interesting is with consent forms.

I think it’s going to get a bit like Harry Potter, like the Daily Prophet, when everything’s all animated and moving around about digital consent forms that have got videos all slotted inside them that are custom to the patient. It’s going to be pretty amazing. And that’s the good thing about dentistry is that we’re always really ahead with technology.

3D scanners, but where else does a patient see that? Nowhere, but the photography, smile design and all that, it’s absolutely amazing stuff. But I just think that all that administration is still stuck in the 90s. I mean, it’s improved, but that’s kind of where it has been. So it’ll be good just to try and push it to kind of catch up with everything else.

[Jaz]
Well, I salute you for doing a big part in terms of our problem, the main problem of note writing. I just want to give a little caveat, actually, you know, ChatGPT, I use it a lot. And I remember one day giving it some data and I asked for it to, okay, can you just fix this from like, remove the decimal point, remove all these numbers and paste it back to me.

And it pasted it back to me. And just before I copied it, I was like, hang on a minute, something doesn’t seem right here. I pasted 71 rows and it pasted back to me 70 rows and I actually said to ChatGPT, listen, is there a row missing? And you know what ChatGPT said? He said, oh, I’m so sorry. I made a mistake.

Oh, what the f! I couldn’t believe it. I mean, fair enough if I asked it for an opinion about a poem, it could make a mistake, subjective kind of thing. But this was numbers. So that day, that little sentence at the bottom of ChatGPT that says, AI can make mistakes. The reason I’m mentioning this is it is our responsibility as clinicians to check.

So this does not mean Digital TCO, any product using AI. It does not mean we just generate it and copy and paste it into your note taking software. It is our duty to check it. But you know what, as I’ve been checking the ones I’ve been formulating with Digital TCO, I’m just checking. I’m smiling.

Odd thing here and there. I might just add a word or just delete like the date thing, for example, right? There are little things like that. But for me, it mostly I’m smiling and I’m mostly saying to Zoe, check this out, Zoe, check this out, right? So mostly I’m smiling and copying and pasting, but I’m doing my due diligence and checking.

It’s really important because AI can make mistakes and it’s not Kevin’s fault if AI makes, it’s just AI. It is what it is. So everyone don’t get too complacent. Always be a good habit of checking everything before you copy it and paste it. But your notes will elevate in terms of quality. Actually, what happened in the surgery is what’s going to be on there.

And you know what? Sometimes people are scared about this, Kevin, because sometimes people, they hide behind their template because the template is there like, oh, the template says I did it, so it means I did it, but you didn’t do it right. So what this does is scary at first, right? But it really helps you to elevate your game.

And he starts getting you think more about checklists. How can we checklist everything? How can I be a better clinician? So I don’t forget to warn my patients that the sinus could be involved in OAC. You know that I always forget to say it, but it’s in my notes, but that’s not good enough. It needs to be contemporaneous.

It needs to be real. It needs to be contemporaneous. So the quality and efficiency is all there. So salute you. Kevin, keep up the good work. I can’t wait to see how it grows over the next few months. As a Protruserati joined you, thanks for selecting the community to work with, to help better your product. But also I’m excited for them to have this kind of gift in a way of an absolute steal of a product that is really pioneering AI and no writing in dentistry.

[Kevin]
Thank you so much, Jaz. Thanks for having me on. It’s been a pleasure working with you as well because this, the Jaz Mode is going to be just completely game changing when it’s really good.

[Jaz]
Amazing. And thanks for your engagement on Protrusive Guidance. It’s been great to have you. You posted a really cool video about how you communicate with patients in the practice that you’re at with the whiteboard.

That was really cool. So appreciate the value that you’re putting in. And you haven’t even mentioned DigitalTCO once on that. You’re just literally there. You’re helping everyone. And this is what Protruserati is all about. They’re the nicest and kindest, geekiest dentists in the world. So I really appreciate you being part of that.

[Kevin]
No problem. I think it’s a fantastic platform. I wish I had it more when I was practicing. It’s really a good way to feel more connected to the people who like want to do things. And I like going on and just, blah, because I’ve got my own little ways and things. I like to think about things. So it’s good to just be able to just splinter them out.

[Jaz]
It’s been fantastic so far. So I’ll put the offer also in the centric relationships section of the app as well, or the website protrusive.App. So anyone who didn’t catch the URLs, it’s on Protrusive Guidance, click on centric relationships, and I’ll add the Digital TCO collaboration so that we can help to get our notes. Absolutely awesome. Absolutely efficient. So super exciting times.

[Kevin]
Yeah, brilliant. Yeah, thank you, Jaz. And like I said, anybody has any comments or things, just put it in there and I’ll sort it all out.

Jaz’s Outro:
Brilliant. Well, there we have it, guys. Never write notes again. How exciting are you? My second dream is coming alive and maybe one day I’ll get a dishwasher too. This episode is eligible for CPD, so if you scroll down on Protrusive Guidance, for those on a paid plan, you can actually answer a quiz and get CPD. But the main thing to do is, if the pain of note writing and the quality of notes is a problem for you. And also with the ability to use AI to generate letters and stuff.

And that’s all like up and coming. But if you really want to unlock Jaz Mode, like I was absolutely desperate for this and Kevin’s making it happen, but even just to use it, how Kevin intended it, so that instead of typing, you just say a few things and it uses AI and the nurse’s input to create the perfect notes.

Now, like I said, at the end of the episode, the biggest barrier to using it, yeah, it could be the microphone. And that’s why I’ve got the video on YouTube and Protrusive Guidance about testing different microphones. It’s actually a demo of how I use digital TCO. But it’s your mindset. If your mindset’s not in the right place, if you’re resistant to change, if you’re already happy with the templates you’re using, happy days.

That’s cool. But for me, I wasn’t. The templates weren’t enough. I even moved to custom screens. It wasn’t enough. I tried a few of the more popular softwares out there. It was too much repetitive strain injury, too much clicking. My nurse didn’t like it. But Zoe is absolutely loving Digital TCO because she has to do less as well.

And the quality of the notes, let’s really look at the quality of the notes. i.e is it representative of what actually happened? This is really, really exciting. So let’s develop this together. And I watch your space. I thank you, anyone who signs up. Thanks so much for being part of this project, for being like a founding member of Digital TCO.

And I know that Kevin will not let you down because he’s been absolutely brilliant day and night, funky hours in terms of helping us improve his baby, his product. This is his everything now. And I love the fact that he’s a dentist and his background is so invaluable in this space of AI and helping us to achieve this mission.

So head over to protrusive.co.uk/notes, and let’s talk about it on Protrusive Guidance, our platform to discuss and share our wins and challenges. So let’s develop this together. So if you’re not already on Protrusive Guidance, head over to protrusive.App, make an account, we’ll approve you once we verify you’re a dentist and there’ll be a space for Digital TCO and we’ll keep each other posted and you get to actually liaise with Kevin as well, who’s actually been instrumental on the platform.

He’s been an absolute joy to have on this community. So I look forward to seeing you guys there. Thank you so much for listening all the way to the end. Thank you to my lovely team for this one. It was Erika, Nav, and Mari for the eventual CPD. And of course, thank you for being a Protruserati. I’ll catch you same time, same place next week. Bye for now