Prodent, the teeth of Mac

Many times we find a user… a macintosh user who brings his interest on the platform to develop tools for his job. Today we introduce you Sandro Montecchiani… dentist.

Hello, Dr. Montecchiani, where are you from?

Hello, I am an Italian Dentist, I live and work in Norcia, a small town in central Italy. Perhaps you know it, becouse it is famous for the “tartufo nero” and becouse was the birthplace of San Benedetto, the European Patron.

When did you began tu use mac computers and to develop specific dental software?

I began many years ago, about 1987. I bought my first computer becouse I needed to run a software, Quick Ceph, for cephalometric traces, that are measurements on cranial structure, useful for treatment plannig in orthodontics. After a while I realized that it would be used for a lot of other things, so I started to transfer some parts of my cases-history on the Mac, using a simple database software, called FileMaker.

What hard, soft, periferics resources have you use for you first Dental management solution version? Tell us a little about this soft developement history, please. Which where your objetivs when you began? What kind of data do you work in with your software? Which are the dental needs?

When I started I had only a computer, a Mac II Si, with a 30 MHZ 68030 processor, 40 MB Hard Disk,16 MB Ram. The monitor was a 13″ color display. It was situated on the desktop in my personal office and I was the only person using it. Periferics was a printer Imagewriter II and the digitizer of QuickCeph system.

After a little time I realized that one single Mac was inadequate, so I bought another Mac that I placed in the secretary’s office, so I could delegate some operations such as entry data and invoicing.I did a small network using localtalk.

In the following years I bought other Macs, up to complete the network, but it was too slow under localtalk, so I upgraded to the 10 Mbit ethernet, and recently to a 100 Mbit ethernet.

About software development, the first plan was the gradual transfer from the paper to the digital of all the administrative data. It was an experiment to check the utility of a computerized management of my activity. I developed the software using Filemaker, a database development tool. It was simple to create a small software to manage simple data such as personal data and medical history.

The realization was immediately irreplaceable, so many other tasks were added, such as the possibility to create costs estimate for my clients, and invoicing. About costs estimate, it was simple to select a professional service from a choice list and the software automatically added it in a row, with Service description and its price by looking at a list in an external file. This system is the same as today,with some improvements.

Invoicing was also very simple, a click on a button on the accounting layout activated an automatic task and in a few seconds the invoicing was printed, ready for the client.

At the end of every month, it was possible with only a click, to create quickly a monthly report.

It was soon possible to replace all the data on paper with the digital data. A simple evening backup on a removable media (first a Syquest 270 Removable HD, than a Iomega Zip 100) protected from data loss, and was useful to work at home to improve the software.

The software produced automatically all the paper documents used in my job; forms for filling personal data, medical hystory, costs estimate, statement, debt-collection letters and so on. At this time a clinical part was introduced in the software, so it was necessary to have more computers. So there was a Mac in the secretary’s room, and then two others, in operating rooms. The software allowed access to data stored in a computer that was working as a server from all the other computers, and the network was the inexpensive AppleTalk, via serial port.

Successively the software was improved, thanks to the developing tools improvements. But the great jump was the transition from Filemaker 2 to 3 version. In fact the database, up to that time not relational (flat file database) became relational, giving to the users a powerfool development tool, also for the expansion of the language.

So the Prodent, (I called so my software) changed greatly both in the engine and in the interface (and we was in dicember 1998) assuming a more professional look and a great capacity to control my business.

In the same time I bought a scanner (HP scanjet 3C with optional trasparency adapter) so I could acquire radiographic images such as cranial and panoramic dental radiographs (Rx) as well as old small intraoral Rxs.

The possibility to acquire theese images and see them on the monitor increased greatly my diagnostic ability. All this for the possibilities to enlarge,process and improve the images, doing them more readable.

Image files are not saved inside the database, to avoid to weight it down, they are stored as files in an external hard disk that have only this task. To manage theese images I used an external filemaker plug-in, its name is Insidescan, An Italian softwarehouse (Powersolutions s.r.l.) produces it. It is a very useful software and it allowed me to increase the database tasks. By the plug-in, many tasks are automatic and simplified, such as the scanner acquiring, started directly from inside Prodent, and also names generation and storing in a specific folder of the images. User do only some click (4-5 at all) on buttons and the image is automatically scanned and stored.

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What system, hardware and periphericals machines are you using actually?

Actually my computerized system is a Client-Server network based on 6 Macintosh computers connected via a fastEthernet at 100Mbit/sec (all except one, an ald Mac at 10 Mbit, that I will change soon) by a Farallon Fast Starlet Dual Speed Hub with 8 ports.

The computers are:

PowerMac 6100 powered by a NewertTech G3 233 card, in the secretary room (the oldest Mac).

Powermac 7300/220 working as a Server.

Imac 233 at the Reception.

PowerMac Cube 400 in my private office.

PowerMac 7600 powered by a Sonnet G3 400 MHZ card in Operatory room 1.

IMac LCD G4 700 MHZ with CD Burner in Operatory room 2 (my last buy, it’s beautiful).

There are then some peripherics. In the order they are:

– Apple personal laser writer 320 for networking printing.

– Epson Stylus photo 870 in my private office.

– HP Scanjet II 3C with trasparency adapter.

– RVG Regam (radiovisiography) a digital system of radiography that allows to take intraoral radiographs with a digital wired sensor, without need of radiograph films or developing liquids. You take the radiograph and immediately tme image appears on the monitor; a good advantage.

This system is about 6 years old, and I have in my mind to change it with another newer, with USB interface and a better image resolution. At today the best on the market seems to be the one produced by French Trophy. It is Mac OS X and Classic compatible.

– Nikon Coolpix 5000 digital camera, for orthodontic cases photos and for communications with the dental mechanic laboratory.

– CompactFlash Reader by NewerTech, to transfer digital images to the Mac without USB cable.

– Zip Iomega SCSI attached to the server.

– Zip Iomega USB to the Cube.

– External Hard disk SCSI attached to the Server, used as network server to store images (Photos, Radiographs).

The server has an own UPS to prevent loss data for current interrupt.

Lets talk about the last version. Which are the newest improvements?

Last improvements concerns especially networking. I tried to get better the development to obtain improvement in speed. Some tasks, that were quickly in single user mode, were too slow in multiuser environment, so I’am working around again. I also resolved some bugs when more than a user was contemporary working on data entry. About a year ago I modified the software to use the new European currency, the Euro. This conversion allowed me to keep old data, in Italian Lire, and at the same time, to work with the new one.

Is your soft done for macintosh computers only or it can be use on others platforms?

Filemaker Pro Solutions are Cross-Platform. My software works also under Windows. I did some tests in a Mac-Pc network, using TCP/IP protocol. It seemed to works properly, even if I didn’t execute exhaustive tests.

It´s a comercial or freeware software? Where can the specialists users find it? Have you done any tutorial for your software, professional specifics questions?

My solution is at today, gave only at a limited number of dentists, to test the possibility of a commercial use. A demo version will be soon available on my web site.

One of the best difficult things was to do a user manual explaining how to use the software. I’m working around about from 2 years, and I have realized a not complete version only for an internal use by my secretary and my chair-assistant.

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Lets talk a little about you. How old are you? Do you have informatic studies too? Why did you began using mac?

I am 48 years old, I took my degree in Medicine and Surgery and after a short period dedicated to General Medicine, I chose Dentistry. I have no specific informatic studies; I am a self-taught man. Today there are a lot of informatic courses, but at that time (15 years ago) it was’nt so. The choice of a Macintosh was at the beginning a chance. I looked at one in an Orthodontic School and I was fascinated by it, expecially for the user interface by icons. At that time the only choice was PCs with MS-Dos operating system…

Which are the benefits using mac on professional orthodontial aplies?

There are a lot of benefits; you can store data and find them successively in a few seconds, it is fundamental. Theese data can be statistically analized, and it is impossible to do with data on paper, without spend a lot of time. Printing personalized forms, statement,debt-collection letters and any other type of comunication or information is very easy. It is possible to create reports automatically, and the possibilities to share data and look at them from any place in the office, help to works better and faster.

The Macintosh user-friendly interface allowed me to instruct secretary and chair assistant very well and in a few time. And becouse of Macintosh reliability, in 15 years I never needed an hardware (or software) technician. I installed myself also ethernet cables!

And I never lose an hour of time for software problems. Howewer it seems to be a common problem on PCs with Windows OS…

Talking about your future soft projects, please. Should have work on a new version perhaps for X system? Another orthodontial soft researchs?

The software is continuosly improved, for new tasks added and for those changed. The suggestions by secretary and chair-assistant were and are fundamentals also for improving human software interface. Actual version runs also under Mac OS X. I will use it as soon as all my machines will be up to date to newer models. I am not in a hurry, the system is working very well (actually I am running mac OS 8.6 and 9.2).

The goal I am working around now is to have the total control over all the aspect of my job, from business production to time working of my variuos professional services, to the time managing in the weekly planning, to the materials supply and so on. In other words, a modern system to manage human, financial and technological resources.

Thank you very much. Nice to meet you, we hope to know about your Dental management solutions development on future.

I will send you any information about. You can also see any news on my website, the address is below.

Thanks for giving me the chance to show my work to your readers.

Sandro Montecchiani

Medico Chirurgo – Odontoiatra

http://www.prodent.it/

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Anónimo
Anónimo
21 years ago

Do you have an English version?

Thanks
Sam

Anónimo
Anónimo
21 years ago

Please notify ASAP, when you have an English version that runs under jaguar…

Anónimo
Anónimo
20 years ago

Hola soy un dentista en Peru y necesito programas acerca de odontologia para mi I’mac aqui muy pocos dentistas usan macs pero yo deseo usar mi mac…si alguien puede decirme donde en internet puedo encontrar programas para uso del consultorio…estare muy agradecido.

Anónimo
Anónimo
17 years ago

As for the Giants, their own happiness was short-lived as they lost to – who else?

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