Need more time? Train now, to be more productive and fulfilled
Featured Products Promotional FeaturesPosted by: Dental Design 25th January 2023
Time is something often in short supply for dentists. Sometimes, despite putting all the hours in, you will wish you had more left at the end of the week.
An ideal work-life balance means something different to everyone and it can also change throughout the course of your career. As a novice, you likely couldn’t wait to start caring for patients, keen to absorb new experiences and as much knowledge as possible. The learning curve while you’re building the basics is often the steepest it will ever be and, even when you’re coming home exhausted, every day teaches you something new. In those early days, ‘good’ stress will keep you on your toes and motivated to find a way to help and engage with people, especially those whom you’re struggling to connect with.
As you progress, though, you might want more time to focus on family, friends or hobbies, or things that will enrich your career, like education and further training. You may feel frustrated by knowing that, if you could get to know your patients better, this would be the key to them improving their oral health.
One sign that your work-life balance is imbalanced is when you start feeling blown off course and disconnected. A healthy work-life balance means you will be (mostly) fulfilled and content, wherever you are, in practice or not. Because this is a personal metric, and there will be times when you are happy to sacrifice your career for personal commitments, and vice versa, you must know when to make changes. Take a step back to consider your priorities, what really matters to you. All dental professionals aim to be doing the kind of dentistry they want to do, and that they enjoy. But you will also want time to teach, learn, travel as well and have some left for yourself.
A way to create more time and freedom in your future is to start postgraduate training early in your career. For me, learning how to be an implant dentist ticks every box. Firstly, it will teach you how to be a great communicator, who really gets the most out of every appointment. Even if you think you have good relationships with patients now, when you are delivering implant therapies you will be having better conversations with them about function and aesthetics, and the role they have for keeping their treatment stable and maintained.
When you learn to be an implant dentist, you will also be able to create a brilliant team around you. These will be the people who make coming into work less stressful, and far more enjoyable, as well as improve your treatment outcomes. Once you tell colleagues you offer implants and want to build a team, you will find they will be proud to stand alongside you, learning about the processes and protocols and getting to know the patients during their journey. The satisfaction that comes from restoring a smile will be even greater when it’s shared.
Implant work is scientific, creative, challenging and can help you appreciate what it means to really care for people. Delivering and restoring implants will allow you to form deeper bonds with patients and colleagues and develop personally as well as professionally. It will open the door to lifelong learning and even travel, as you find out about the latest techniques and materials. With demand for dental implants set to keep rising, you will have a valuable income stream too, for the chance of financial freedom.
For high-quality training in the heart of London, The One to One Implant Education offers fully accredited postgraduate training to take you from novice to confident implant dentist. This is a comprehensive and progressive programme, with a significant portion of the teaching time dedicated to getting hands-on with to live surgery. You will be taught by renowned implantologists and educators who have carved out inspirational and aspirational careers and now want to share that knowledge. You’ll learn transferable skills, like communication, and gain an understanding of the importance of teamwork. You’ll be ready to get going as soon as the course is complete, with the opportunity to continue your learning with the advanced programme, which will take your practise to a whole new level.
To get the time you need and want, take a step back and think about how you can direct your career. Take postgraduate training early and you will give yourself more freedom and flexibility, as you settle into your dentistry, to enable you to create the right work-life balance for you. Choose a high-demand area like dental implants, where you will be both a leader and be working as part of team, and you will be on the road to finding more fulfilment, productivity and a real enjoyment of your work.
To reserve your place or to find out more, please visit
https://121implanteducation.co.uk or call 020 7486 0000.
Author bio:
Dr Fazeela Khan-Osborne is the founding clinician of the FACE dental implant multi-disciplinary team for the One To One Dental Clinic based on Harley Street, London. She has always had a passion and special interest in implant dentistry, particularly in surgical and restorative full arch rehabilitation of the maxilla. She has been involved in developing treatment modalities for peri-implantitis within clinical practice.
Dr Khan-Osborne is also the Founding Course Lead for the One To One Education Programme, now in its 20thyear. As a former Lead Tutor on the Diploma in Implant Dentistry course at the Royal College of Surgeons (England), she lectures worldwide on implant dentistry and is an active full member of the Association of Dental Implantology, the British Academy of Aesthetic Dentistry and the International Congress of Oral Implantologists.
