Tele dentistry - A modern day boon to dental practice

Abstract

Telemedicine is the use of electronic information to communicate technologies to provide and support healthcare when distance separates the participants. Brown N. A brief history of telemedicine. Teledentistry is a field that combines telecommunications and dentistry to provide newer opportunities of dental education and delivery of oral care. It involves delivering data in the form of clinical information and images from one point (spoke point) to another point (hub site) for dental treatment using telecommunications technology. It can potentially improve the accessibility and delivery of oral healthcare, extending to underserved patient populations, such as those in rural areas, at a reasonable cost. Teledentistry can thus eliminate the disparities in oral health care between urban and rural communities. This article reviews the role of teledentistry in different fields of dentistry.