Buying decisions

Before adding another portal, name the step it replaces

A clinic and laboratory may already use a scanner portal, practice software, email and telephone. A new workspace can make a handoff easier to follow while also creating another place to enter information.

The practical purchasing question is which part of the current process changes. Does the shared record replace a separate instruction email? Does it become the place both parties acknowledge a revision? Or must staff copy the same information into it after completing the existing process?

Start with a typical completed order and one change. Identify where the instruction is created, where acceptance is recorded and where a changed date becomes visible. Include the time spent locating records and reconciling differences. A short entry form is not necessarily a shorter end-to-end process.

A narrow change may be enough. The initial need could be accepted-version clarity rather than a replacement for production management, invoicing or clinical records. If the existing system already handles that task reliably, an additional portal may offer little value.

ConnectDent is being developed around instructions, acknowledgements and exceptions across a clinic–laboratory relationship. It does not replace the dentist’s clinical judgement or the laboratory’s production system. Its proposed commercial value depends on resolving a recurring handoff problem without creating more work elsewhere. That value remains to be established with participating organisations.

Before adding another portal, name the step it replaces

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