Saridas: saratoga integrated dental simulation platform
Dental departments are losing clinical faculty to private practice as it is a more lucrative option. The effect of the loss of dental faculty requires dental institutes to find ways to meet the student needs during practicals. Saratoga S.p.A is a company that was established in 1973 that manufactures dental equipment, furniture as well as dental educational tools and systems. Saratoga has developed SARIDAS which is a computerised, dental artificial intelligence-based platform that responds to the challenges faced by dental students and clinical faculty. SARIDAS consists of four components. It contains a smart dental simulator that has a phantom head in which oral diseases are replicated for the student to practice treatment procedures. It also possesses an interactive tool that transmits images, videos and audio between workstations allowing for communication between a student and the instructor. The third component is an augmented reality unit which tracks the handpiece in the mannequin’s oral cavity and provides highly accurate assessment of student’s work. The last component is an artificial intelligence software ‘brain’ that interconnects the above 3 components and also contains a database in which clinical data about different oral conditions and the methods of treatment can be stored for use by the students. The smart brain component provides predictive technology and offers guidance to students on how to treat diseases that they have not yet encountered in the classroom. Our system provides unlimited practice from multiple pre-recorded dental exercises and the database provides students with access to international pathology data. SARIDAS offers instant feedback for correction where students would otherwise only be able to practice when the instructor is available. Our system allows for self-determined learning which is key for student success.