July Update

For our July communication to our wonderful patients who regularly consume our updates, it would probably be wrong not to chat about what happened in the election at the start of the month.

If you're receiving this for the first time, then welcome. I hope you enjoy it; for anyone who doesn't, it's easy to unsubscribe as we would never want to disturb or disrupt you, but we try to keep people up to date with what we're doing and what's happening in the Clinic as part of our overall engagement. 

We obviously ended up with a change of government in July, which didn't really seem to be a surprise, but for all of us working in healthcare, we wonder what impact or effect that might have.

The sad reality is that it appears that there is not really any more money to spend, and so while the politicians may try to spend the money smarter or more wisely in their eyes, it's unlikely that major new investment in NHS services is likely to occur.

The Total Care Club

This is one of the things that has prompted us to develop the Total Care Club at the Clinic, our general dental capitation scheme, which is very different from other existing capitation schemes.

We aim to provide you with as much predictable care as possible and to provide you with the highest level of general dental care to maintain your oral health, maintain your teeth and look after things for your entire life.

It's all set, obviously in our environment, with some extraordinary clinicians and team members looking after you and it was started to be rolled out a month ago, and we're delighted with the response and the success we've already achieved.

We're moving forward to a capped amount of people on this scheme so that we can maintain service, but if you are interested in a dental plan that will look after you and your family members with hassle-free peace of mind care, knowing that you're covered for dental eventualities and knowing that your health will be in our hands, then please don't hesitate to contact us here and look for a total care club and have a conversation with one of our team about the possible advantages. 

The Campbell Academy

In other news, at the Clinic, you may or may not be aware that we are quite a large education provider, both in implant dentistry for qualified dentists and business education.

This week, we host one of the most famous implant clinicians in the world, Professor Rony Jung, from the University of Zurich. He will provide a two-day master class education seminar for our dentists.

This will also be filmed and edited and will be broadcast on Thursday night to a global audience of dentists around the world in a webinar platform. It's a big deal for us, but more and more, we're providing this type and level of education as ambassadors and innovators throughout the dental industry.
I hope that gives you peace of mind of the fact that we are at the cutting edge of what's happening in dentistry and are partnered with some of the best clinicians in the world. 

Social Legacy

We've also re-established our links with the charity Bridge2Aid in the past few months. 

Bridge2Aid had taken a different tack in their strategic approach of how they wanted to work with individuals in Africa and what their charity was looking for. It didn't really fit with our approach of our social legacy projects but they have recently appointed new members of staff and have changed their approach once more to a way which fits much better with our approach to charity giving.

As you may be aware, we provide 1% of our overall turnover to social legacy projects as a business, which has amounted to hundreds of thousands of pounds over the past year.

We're very keen that the money we use to assist people is in keeping with our values, and I'm delighted that we're working with Bridge2aAid again.

One of the things we're doing with Bridge2Aid is funding their on-the-ground coordinator in Tanzania. This coordinator is helping with access to emergency dental care and dental health for individuals in Tanzania, which has a population of around 70 million and only 600 dentists. 

Through our work with Bridge2Aid, we have achieved a great deal in that country and hope to achieve a great deal more.

On the topic of social legacy, some of our team will also be participating in the Newark Dragon Boat Race Festival in September. This event will raise money for The Children's Bereavement Centre and Beaumond House Hospice Care. If you want to support the team, you can do so here! 

Appointments

In clinic news, our shift system is working extremely well. Many of our patients enjoy the later appointments they can achieve on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, together with the early starts at 7.30 on those days for those who are up bright and breezy. 

This has allowed us to provide more care and services, including increasing the number of root filling services and orthodontic services and maintaining a very low waiting list for all the services that we offer.

Moving forward, we will continue to expand and improve this as much as possible.

The robots are coming

It's also great to be able to announce that we are the first practice in the United Kingdom to be furnished with Straumann's new Falcon system. 

This system allows us to computer plan our dental implant cases but instead of using a plastic guide that clips onto the teeth, it allows us to use a haptic handpiece, which uses a visual aid to steer the placement of dental implants in an extraordinarily accurate way.

It is the first machine of its kind at this level in the world, and we have it now to begin exploring its possibilities and using it.

Don't worry, we would never be using this on you without asking and explaining fully, but it just goes to show the direction of travel in dentistry and where we'll be in the next five years.

I look forward to seeing many of you in the waiting room and in the practice. If you need any assistance from us, please, as always, don't hesitate to contact us.

We are happy to help anyone who is in difficulty, be that you or your friends or your family if they have difficulty finding care elsewhere.