Bringing Technology to the Profession of Correctional Dentistry!
Smallwood Prison Dental Services (SPDS) began providing correctional dental services in 2004 where the need to bring technology to the Profession of Correctional Dentistry for tracking/monitoring of dental activity was evident.
Correctional Dental Software (CDS) was initially an accumulation of excel spreadsheets that developed into a patented - web based application developed to monitor/manage large scale – statewide dental operations in correctional settings. CDS has vast experience and has been deployed in ~ 140 prisons, servicing over 200,000 inmates with ~ 380 dental professionals utilizing CDS on a daily basis to monitor and manage their dental operations.
Prior to CDS, and still today - many Department of Corrections dental operations run off of paper/pencil and three ring binder systems or medical systems deployed in a dental environment - these do not work.
Prior to CDS’ implementation in all markets, monthly reports were tabulated manually with no accountability, reporting capabilities were inadequate to non-existent, and lists of patients waiting to be treated were tracked via paper and pencil and three ring binders. There was no tracking of intake, initial, routine, or sick call/urgent care wait times, no tracking of daily schedules, no history reporting of treatment received, no tracking of oral surgery referrals, to list a few. Since the implementation of CDS, thousands of paper logs have been replaced with electronic records, which can be easily accessed for automated and timely tracking purposes.
CDS automates all tracking criterion from logging in all dental requests and prioritizing treatment based on the discipline of dentistry - to how long patients have been waiting for treatment. CDS deploys a full scheduling functionality and has developed 1,000’s of algorithms to implement an effective utilization management program that tracks procedures performed. The end result of CDS - massive reporting capabilities based off of the respective results (or lack of) at each facility and rolled up to state wide summaries/results. With CDS being implemented in various markets, SPDS solicited feedback from front end users and literally 1,000’s of upgrades have been implemented where CDS is now = 100% tailored to our Profession of Correctional Dentistry. Most staff now state “How did we ever run the dental operations without CDS?”
Many efficiencies are brought about by CDS such as the recognition/elimination of duplicate requests (rampant in our Industry), no more patients on waiting lists that have been transferred to another facility or are no longer incarcerated. CDS recognizes these, behind the scenes with no user intervention. Staff no longer have to spend hours upon hours comparing their respective bed log against lists of patients waiting to be treated to see if the patient is still there. These alone bring about tremendous time savings and accountability for our staff. With the majority of department of corrections dental departments, when an inmate is transferred from facility A to Facility B, the inmate is “Lost in the System”. Vision an inmate waiting for an extraction at facility A, then transfers to facility B. Facility B had no clue the patient was waiting at Facility A for an extraction. The inmate has to submit another request. CDS recognizes these transfers - and transfers the inmates existing request (with the original Date of Request) to the forwarding facility. Inmates are not lost in the system –avoiding potential law suits. With CDS being electronically tied to the facilities bed log - all this is addressed - behind the scenes, with no user intervention in managing inmate transfers between facilities, inmates leaving prison and managing the many duplicate requests. This saves dental staff thousands and thousands of hours per year.
Deploying strategies of implementing medical systems in a dental environment or utilizing three ring binders/paper/pencil systems there is no accountability. Implementing CDS’ web based application that has vast experience in managing large scale state wide dental operations will bring true accountability to your organization.
Lastly, by deploying CDS, we have proven that performance objectives can be accomplished/surpassed with “reduced/less staff”.
The following is a short link-marketing video that exhibits the state of the dental operations within the high majority of Statewide Departments of Corrections - prior to CDS.
For more information regarding CDS and for a detailed demonstration, please contact our Corporate Office at 703-729-9464.
