Is your practice selling mouth guards? If not, you could be missing an opportunity for an extra source of revenue and a way to better care for your patients.
In 2014 the National Federation of High School Associations (NFHS) and the Sports Medicine Advisory Committee (SMAC) mandated the use of mouth guards in multiple sports, including football, field hockey, and wrestling.
It makes sense considering before that an athlete participating in a contact sport had a better than 50% chance of sustaining an oral-facial injury while playing. Not to mention before mouth guards were made mandatory, over 50% of injuries from sports like football were oral-facial.
Now, with the introduction of mandatory mouthguards that number is down to 1%.
And now is the perfect time to start selling as a new school year—and the start of new sports seasons—looms ahead of us. Not to mention all the younger patients you will get in the back to school rush as parents try to avoid having to schedule appointments during class time.
But where should you start? There is a widening variety of mouth guards on the market that are better able to fit the needs of all your contact-sport-loving patients.
Custom-fit mouth guards made from a mold of your patient’s teeth offer the best, most secure-fitting protection. If you have a patient who participates in multiple sports that needs a product that will stand up to a lot of wear this is a great option.
But if your patients are looking for a more inexpensive option, boil and bite mouth guards may be the way to go. New technology is making these far superior to their predecessors as they are better at taking the form of the patients’ teeth and staying secure. Keystone Industries came out with a new boil and bite guard earlier this year called the PF2 that “fits just like a custom guard” (and I can attest to this—I had the good fortune to try one out at the Midwinter meeting and loved it!).
Whichever way you decide to go, mouth guards are a win-win for your office. Compared to more expensive and time-consuming additional treatments, they are much easier to sell. After all, you’re selling a way to prevent an injury that could lead to a much larger dental bill than their mouth guard will cost.
Source:
http://www.dentistryiq.com/articles/dem/print/volume-8/issue-1/materials/mouthguard-evolution.html
https://www.nfhs.org/sports-resource-content/position-statement-and-recommendations-for-mouthguard-use-in-sports/
