Form Meets Function: The Magic of Interdisciplinary Care

Episode #309 with Dr. Tito Norris

Are you tired of the inefficient back-and-forth communication and guesswork with your specialists? Today’s guest will remind you that it can change! Kirk Behrendt brings in Dr. Tito Norris, creator of The Norris 20/26 Bracket System, to talk about the different ways to enhance interdisciplinary communication using modern advancements and technology. To hear more about the value of an interdisciplinary treatment plan and how to increase efficiency, listen to Episode 309 of The Best Practices Show!

Main Takeaways:

Orthodontic partners are one of the most important people to your practice.

Spend time with your specialists to understand what they can and can't do.

There is a need for talented orthodontists who can tackle challenging interdisciplinary cases.

To do sophisticated dentistry, you need to change the patients’ oral landscape.

Interdisciplinary dentistry needs a HIPAA-compliant, cloud-based EMR.

Be willing to make investments in yourself to increase your skill level and differentiate yourself.

Ortho doesn't have to be a two-year penalty box; there are many ways to increase efficiency.

Quotes:

“Something that I picked up a long time ago is, whenever possible, try to get your gingival margins placed at your correct positions in relationship to the CEJ first. In other words, if the patient is going to need some crown lengthening, do it on the front end. Because as an orthodontist, we need one of two things: we either need an accurate CEJ, or we need an accurate incisal edge. And if we can have both, then hallelujah.” (08:39—09:06)

“If teeth have wear on them, we would much prefer — and this is critical — to do pre-orthodontic bonding. So, what does that mean? That means that I want the teeth to be restored provisionally to their natural shapes and forms that they used to be when the patient was a teenager. And you're like, ‘But Tito, how am I going to do that? The occlusion’s not going to allow that.’ Don't worry about the occlusion. That's my job. Your job as a restorative dentist is to restore those teeth and essentially give me back teenager-looking teeth.” (09:25—10:08)

“It became apparent to me in a very early time that we needed a bracket slot dimension that was .020, something that would allow an .019 wire to fit in there and then have really great intimate contact and that's going to give you more control. And it just wasn't available. And why wasn't it available? I just didn't understand this. And the answer I got was, ‘Well, it’s just tradition. It’s just the way it’s always been.’ And I was like, ‘This is ridiculous. No one could give me a good reason as to why we don't have a .020 bracket slot, so I'm actually just going to make one.’ And so, I did.” (17:41—18:25)

“The challenges I had to the previous bracket system was, we were using an .019 wire in an .022 slot. So, we had sloppiness in there. And so, it was difficult to finish the case because you'd have to put in enough torque in the wire to overcome the sloppiness, and then it would start to engage. And then, it was always a guessing game. And so, you'd guess a little too much, and then you'd guess a little too little. And so, there was just all this slop in play and too much tolerance, basically, between the bracket and wire interplay. And that's what made finishing cases challenging.” (19:56—20:35)

“When you subscribe to restoring the teeth to their natural shapes, what you've done is you’ve created a three-dimensional blueprint for communication between the orthodontist and the restorative dentist. So, you've taken all the guesswork out of the communication, because what you've done is you’ve told that orthodontist, ‘I want these teeth exactly this long. I want these teeth...