Intraoral Scanners Continue Market Penetration - Now in 50% or Practices

 

As I mentioned last week, I recently had the opportunity to speak to the Arkansas State Dental Association about the latest and greatest in dental tech.  One of the subjects we spent some time on digital impression systems/intraoral scanners.  This category of devices has seen some incredible growth in the last 5 years and is rapidly becoming the preferred platform for taking dental impressions.

Now comes some solid info that shows this device category is growing even faster than many of us have anticipated.  A couple of years ago we did a survey at Dental Products Report on several aspects of the profession.  Back then I recall the market penetration of digital impression systems was 32.8% from the respondents.

Now comes a report from the ADA Clinical Evaluators Panel which appeared in the Augusts issue of the Journal of the American Dental Association that indicates their respondents using an intraoral scanner is at 53%.  That's a pretty phenomenal number in my opinion.  Of course there is the for sure possibility that because it is a survey of the ADA Clinical Evaluators (ACE) Panel, those replying to the survey may be more inclined to embrace and deploy technology than an average bell shaped curve of dentists.

There are 968 members of the ACE Panel, of whom 369 responded.  Once again... there may be a potential skewing of the results with perhaps respondents being more inclined to respond IF they were users.

My pointing these things out is not to cast skepticism on the numbers, but simply to give you some things to consider.  However, I am very impressed with the growth of this category of tech users.  I've been saying for longer than 5 years that this tech category will continue to grow until analog impression materials and techniques are used only on rare occasions and special clinical situations.

The best part about the survey for me was this: 70% of respondents said the top reason they began using digital impressions is to improve clinical efficiency.  I am thrilled to hear that as no one wants *any* medical procedure to take longer.  Making things run more smoothly while also providing a better clinical outcome is the best thing about digital impressions in my opinion.  That's one of the reasons my office is now using TWO iTero scanners in our 3 doctor practice.

If you would like to see the entire survey follow this link.