Is this the DigiDental Revolution…?! – guest blog

Is this the DigiDental Revolution…?! There has been a lot of talk in the dental industry and certainly the wider medical industry about how we are on the cusp of another digital revolution. It is now not a question of CAN revolutionary technology be built, but SHOULD it be built? As the possibilities of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are increasingly understood, there is a feeling that DigiDental technologies are close to revolutionising the sector. But like with all ideas, some are good and some are bad and over the last six months we have been working on camera phone photo analysis software project that analyses photos to identify various features and with this feature detector being a key indicator dentists would use in identifying plaque build up/calculus/chipped teeth/root exposure etc. We think it could make an impact on dental care. Traditionally, teledentistry sites would allow a dentist in a remote location from the patient to advise on a range of problems based on the photos submitted to the server by a patient. With our technology, these analyses can now be completed via software and could initially be of significant benefit to patients in rural areas or areas of low GDP. As graduates from Cambridge in Computer Science and Northampton Business School, our aim is to run a project over the summer assessing the feasibility of the software to the dental industry by gathering data and insights of as many dental professionals as possible with the intention of getting our findings published and taking the software forward. So, is this the DigiDental Revolution?! SHOULD this technology be researched further? Whatever your opinion is, we would love to hear your feedback and for your to take part in our short questionnaire aimed at getting a detailed insight about current problems facing dentists related to the technology. If you would like to be sent our short questionnaire about this software, please send an email request to jackwilliammiller@hotmail.com. Any data we use will be anonymised and the full results of the survey will be available on request.