BurButler…… This little product went to market…. Hazel Hendy MBA. MSc. & Dr Paul Moore BDS. Now available direct online from www.Steiriliu.com
This has been a team effort. from concept to our new online E-Commerce site available worldwide where we do already have distributors.
Cross infection control was always forefront on our minds, but Covid 19 has sharpened the interest in our products to organise and sterilise and protect against “Aerosol”.
How did we begin? Two heads are better than one and working together has meant at all times each of us could bounce ideas of each other and each lend our own range of skill sets and knowledge to reach where we are today with dealers in 20 countries including USA, Canada, Australia, Korea, UK, Spain, Norway, Portugal, Netherlands, Saudi….
Being a dentist for nearly 40 years has been a great big long learning curve with some sharp corners, and constant development of ideas, design and engineering. That’s the job.
I think it is a natural part of a dentist’s training and nature to want to consider ways of improving what we do and how we do it, to develop a theoretical idea into a practical solution.
But it takes more than the idea to design a product. It needs a driving force to refine your ideas, to market and promote your concept, to engage with the industry, the people, the dentists and the companies.
Ten years ago we started a new company to develop ideas we had had to improve the efficiency of the practice.
Need is the spark of Innovation. What is the problem to solve? Design starts with research and review of similar ideas and consider, explore and expand the ideal functions and features of your idea.
Make sketches and descriptions, and then you have to find a manufacturer and professional designer. It is so important you get this bit right to capture both the high-level design processes and detail-level requirements.
Before approaching a company, do ensure they have a good reputation in the field of your design and material development, compare and contrast them to their competition, ensure they have the relevant ISO certification. ( you will require this later for any medical device registration or CE certification to be able to trade with many companies or countries. )
Make sure you like them, you will be talking to them a lot!
Sign an NDA ( Non Disclosure Agreement ) then meet to discuss
BlockButler
This was our first design and patent to organise the plethora of CAD Cam blocks from several manufacturers with different materials in a range of sizes, shades, materials and translucencies.
The packaging of the cad cam blocks in boxes of 5 was difficult to stock take, to find and replace the blocks and to know exactly what we had and how many of which blocks were in stock at any one time.
We explored this initially with wooden blocks, made by a fine carpenter made of Maple.
They looked beautiful, but if the holes are in a solid material they just DO NOT grip the block adequately.
A fraction too small and you cannot get the block in. Too large and the block is to loose.
We tried perspex. - again looked cool but the function was poor and both deteriorated with time.
Finally we looked at medical grade silicon. This stuff is great. It is elasticated. It will last a lifetime. It can be cast to an accuracy of microns. Now we had a solution that would allow the shape of the CAD CAD chuck to nestle snugly in the rather nice sophisticated “peg board�.
It looks very presentable to the patient and can be mounted on a wall or stored in a drawer.
With 10 rows of 10 holes per board we could arrange our Cerec blocks per manufacturer, material, size, translucency and shade, and know at a glance what is what, find what we need and know what we had to order.
The BlockButler was a simple solution saving time, effort, frustration and money. To have the blocks you need when you need them is essential.
It is such a simple solution to an organisation problem and saves time effort on a laborious and frustrating administration task.
BurButler
One idea cascades to another and enthused by the logical arrangement of Cerec blocks we applied a similar concept to the idea of organising all the dental burs in the practice.
Again the first stage in any product development is to write down your ideal ambitions and then design your features. So we brainstormed the ideal bur block concept and features and contrasted them to the classical solutions out there.
1.Base and Lid must both be an autoclavable material. Many of the still used bur-stands simply cannot be autoclaved either because they have plastic bases or lids. Nowadays with compliance this is unacceptable.
The lid should cover the contents chair side against AEROSOL and the burs should not fall out.
2. No moving or parts that deteriorate requiring replacement. Bungs and hinges create “dead” spots where debris and bacteria might accumulate and as surfaces deteriorate they become rougher. To replacement bung sets is costly and at what stage of deterioration should they be replaced.
3. Every hole should grip very bur shank, fiction, latch or lab snugly but each should be easily removable. With solid burblocks the dentist has to work with a set layout the burs fall out if the block is tipped.
4. The cover should autoclavable but be clear and closed to protect the burs from the aerosol effect in a dental surgery. This is essential to see but protect the contents. They should be removable one handed.
Bung type burblocks all have open metal lids or partial covers. bungs offer another interface to clean and they have to be replaced as they deteriorate. The open lids cannot protect against aerosol effect.
Many of the plastic burstands have no cover. Some still in use cannot be autoclaved.
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5. Burs should not be magnetised. Magnetic bur stands transfer the magnetism to the shanks. This causes the burs to stick to other instruments.
6. Bacteriological verification of the efficacy of the product is essential. Independent bacteriological testing by an authoritative body is a non negotiable requirement.
7. Use with “Single use burs”? Even for single use burs the process of chair side presentation should dictate that the gloved dentist has all the dental burs they require presented so that they do not have to “fish” for burs while wearing gloves, or open packaging without sterile gloves on. To do so during a procedure while gloved and gowned is not acceptable and risks contamination of the packaging of all your bur stock.
By the way. The outer packaging of single use burs is not sterile.
Open your single use burs and set them up for your procedures for the day. Then autoclave the set before use. Every patient.
8. Each dentist should know which burs in the practice belong to their own surgery. This one was easy - colour coding the Bases will allow each dentist or surgery to have their own colour.
9. Burs should be autoclavable when in situ during the sterilisation process. Dental burs should not touch each other in the autoclave. Not having to remove the burs will reduce handling, reduce hazards to the team, saving time, prevent loose burs and increase organisation.
10. Spacing between the dental burs should be such that dentists can access them single handed without tweezers and lift and replace them with ease. So we set to on the design process. Fist designing the hole shape to be a “parabolic” funnel so each bur will grip at the diameter of the end of the inserted bur.
The holes were designed through and through to allow drainage and fluting and location “buds” to centralise the burs when they are placed would allow irrigation and steam penetration.
Solid silicon bases would give integrity of the bases and allow flexibility to grip the burs. Silicon also has natural antimicrobial properties and is suitable for high temperatures required for autoclaving.
We researched a translucent lid polymer material and designing the junction to the base to allow steam penetration with raised vertical ridges on the skirt of the closed lid. The base was modified to “collapse” when engaged by the lid to create a grip between base and lid.
A good Patent officer is essential at this point. The IP of your design is the key to your commercial success. An initial patent was drawn up and submitted.
Company formation, branding, marketing, website, CRM, legal framework, funding, manufacturing supply chains, packaging, pricing, medical device registration, CE marking all have to be considered.
A business plan was debated and agreed that we would develop a market plan as a B2B strategy. As a small company we knew that local knowledge and local marketing would be required so we had to show our BurButler at the industry showcases and engage with dealers around the world.
It was with nervous excitement the day the first BurButlers were tested.
Colleagues were asked their opinions and thoughts and refinements were made.
Bacteriological testing was completed and compared to the competition.
We were ready to go.
We took a stand at the IDS in Cologne with 180,000 dentists and had excellent reception for our innovation. Eight years later we have partners in Japan, Australia, South Korea, Finland, Norway, Spain, Portugal, Saudi, UK , Netherlands, Canada and France. The rest of the world we are serving with www.steiriliu.com ( This is Gealic for “sterilise.�)
BurButler is one of those products that makes life easy. It is a systematic approach to solve a problem of safe and efficient dental bur management from chairside through sterilisation and back to chairside.
Just launched also we have applied the same design concepts to offer two new solutions to the profession.
LaminateButler
An autoclavable tray with an autoclavable lid to allow the systematic sterile presentation of your restorations, (veneers crowns inlays implant components) chairside for delivery to the dentist.
This seems obvious when you consider it, but lab work is not returned from the laboratory autoclaved.
The LaminateButler allows you to keep all those components in order and gives you to option of autoclaving them (with the autoclavable lid in place).
With the curve toward you the restorations naturally match the curve of the upper teeth ( assuming you are sitting behind / beside the patient ) and with the curve away it matches to lower teeth. TaDahhh.
EndoButler
An autoclavable non wearable endodontic adapter for the BurButler to allow the presentation and easy accurate and reliable working length measurement of endodontic instruments by the dental assistant or dentist, with a one use sterile foam insert for file debridirment.
This is the same argument as for the BurButler. We prepare 21mm 25mm 30mm sets of our chosen file system.
These are bagged, autoclaved and ready to go with a full selection of endodontic files. Those that are unused can be reprocessed and used again.
I hope this gives an insight to our company and products.
For more information please do:
Email us support@steiriliu.com
or
See our new E-Commerce website www.steiriliu.com