Impact of expanded-duty assistants on cost and productivity in dental care delivery.
Data from an experimental dental program are used to develop a linear programming model of dental care delivery that the authors use to examine the economic implications of introducing expanded-duty dental assistants (EDDA's) in three types of dental practices. The authors examine the changes in productivity and profitability that result from hiring one or more EDDAs and conclude that a dentist in solo practice can more than double his net revenue by hiring one EDDA but will not increase his productivity further by hiring additional EDDAs. Two- and three-dentist groups also can increase revenue by hiring EDDAs, but, beyond a certain point, an inverse relationship exists between the number of auxiliaries hired and net revenue generated.
D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D003726:Dental Assistants / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D003729:Dental Care; D004468:Economics, Dental; D004526:Efficiency; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D011382:Programming, Linear; D014481:United States