A Hands-On Introductory Course in Treating Sleep Apnea

This course is designed to help you decide if you want to treat sleep apnea in your dental practice.  What day to day tasks are critical to successfully treating sleep apnea in a dental practice? Understanding the Insurance companies and the realistic and not so realistic requirements. Understand the medical doctors -  their concerns and needs and how it impacts on you.

At the completion of this program, you will be able to:

• Understand the daily routines of a dental sleep medicine practice;
•  Identify the keys to an effective patient examination for oral appliance therapy;
•  Recognize key concepts related to the insertion of the selected oral appliance
•  Understand side effects and their management.
• Understand Medical doctors concerns and needs and how to develop Physician referrals
• Understand Medical Insurance billing for oral appliances by a dentist and how to Get Paid

Most general dentists will find that the clinical treatment of snoring and sleep apnea is well within their comfort zone. Participants will have an opportunity to take impressions, bite records and perform a clinical exam. Selection and fitting of a lab fabricated custom oral appliance will be demonstrated. Each participant will be able to fabricate a trial sleep appliance to allow patients to “test drive” the oral appliance.

The second half of the day will focus on the big challenge of dealing with the insurance companies, getting medical doctors to comfortably work with dentists in treating a serious medical condition and dealing with the occlusal changes that can be a side effect of oral appliance therapy. Good systems are critical to success in dental sleep medicine.

course Description —

• Screening for Obstructive Sleep Apnea in the Dental Practice
• Patient Evaluation with Home Sleep Testing and Polysomnogram
• How Does Oral Appliance Therapy Help Treat Obstructive Sleep Apnea?
• Oral Appliance  impression and bite records - Designs and Fabrication
• Implementation of Systems, Office Flow, and Integration into Your Practice
• Documentation, Medical Billing, and Reimbursement for the Dental Practice
• Communicating with Physicians and Sleep Laboratories