Supplies Management Protocol

The efficient management of clinical supplies is essential to a smoothly operating dental office.  Too many supplies ties up excess money in unnecessary items, and too few supplies results in rescheduled patients or other embarassing circumstances.  The following protocol should serve as a guideline for day to day management of clinical supplies.

- Inventory of disposable items items should occur weekly

- Dental materials should be written on the white board when there is only a 2 week supply remaining

-  Orders should be placed weekly and should try to group all items together to avoid shipping charges

- Volume discounts should be pursued, if space and high usage allow

- 2 week supply of frequently used items should be located in each treatment room

- 2 week supply of all items should be located in the supply cabinets

- Special items requests should be placed on the white board and circled

- Minimum varieties of supplies will help to save space and make ordering easier in the future

- The chairside assistant should dismiss the patient and return to clean and setup the room for the next patient

- Orders should be written and faxed to the supply house

- Backorders must be tracked to ensure that they arrive before they are actually needed