Susan Gunn

House Ethics Committee. US Senate SELECT Committee on Ethics. ADA Code of Ethics. Every state, professional organization and institution has a code of ethics.

It's interesting there is a need for such governing bodies. The vision of what is ethical vs. unethical varies in different cultures, in different societies, in different ages, and in different human beings.

So, the governing bodies had to establish what is acceptable behavior and what is not acceptable behavior with a Code of Ethics.

I have seen a growing trend of employee entitlement in the embezzlement investigations I have completed for practices over for the past few years. Office staff have been remorseful at being caught, but not necessarily for the wrong doing to the practice or doctor or fellow staff or patients.

Out of exploring practice embezzlement and embezzler's behavior, my new course, "Ethics is a choice - your choice" was created. Studying ethics and how it relates to practices uncovered the following.

There is no such thing as business ethics or personal ethics or spiritual ethics. One person has one set of ethics, which spreads across the entire aspect of their life. Their ethics affect everyone in their life - employer, spouse, kids, friends - everyone. In the embezzlement cases, there have been many victims, not just the doctor but also spouse, kids, family and friends.  Their choices will affect them for the rest of their life.

Bernie Madoff. Just mentioning his name makes anyone in the nation shake their head. How exactly did he gain the trust of those he deceived so easily, to the tune of $3 billion? Highly intelligent people from banks, universities, charities, investment firms, and individuals were taken by his promises of high rates of return for their trust. The list of monetary victims is a relative Who's Who, but sadly, the losses were not only monetary. What were his ethics?

Violating our ethics comes from searing our conscience, one small piece at a time. These people didn't wake up one day to defraud their ethics and others, but did so one small piece at a time. This happens with small children. Once it's easy to take the cookie out of the cookie jar the first time, the second, third or fourth time it doesn't seem quite as wrong. Until the fifth time, when they are surprised their parents consider it wrong.

Here are a few more:

• No one can really teach ethics, but can only make others think about their ethics.
• There are a lot of outside influences to ethics: culture, age, gender, peers, family, etc.
• Most ethics are learned from our family/parents - good or bad.
• Embezzlement and fraud are directly related to a lack of ethical standard in the perpetrator's life.
• Successful companies have strong principles, written and communicated, concerning the company's ethics regarding its vendors and employees, in the form of Foundation Principles, Core Values, Code of Conduct, etc. - it appears to be trendier to NOT call it "Ethics."
• The opposite of thinking one is entitled is being grateful for anything.
• Preaching ethics, which most often happens, does not do anything but alienate those that need to listen the most.

So, how do we emphasize ethics in our practice?

1. Precedence is set by the boss, the doctor of the practice. In each one of the cases above, it was the people in charge that started the unethical behavior. Bosses model behavior in the office, so make sure the behavior you model is the one you want your employees to follow! If you are the boss, lead.

2. In studying corporate ethics principles, I discovered 75% relate to the value of the employee. For instance, one of the Container Store's principles is: "One great employee equals three good employees." Knowing this is in the company's published principles tells the employees upon hiring, they must be a GREAT employee.

3.To establish a Code of Ethics/Conduct in a practice, there has to be an employee buy-in. At a team meeting, have each team member research corporations and their guiding business philosophies. Make it encouraging and fun. What makes these businesses unique? How can that uniqueness apply to your practice? Give them two weeks to do the research, then meet again to compile their findings and write the practice's own Code of Ethics/Conduct.

By the way, the personnel manuals need to be professionally written and approved by the owner of the practice. The enforcement of the Personnel Manual is the owner. The enforcement of the Code of Ethics/Conduct is by the employees themselves.

Ethics is a choice. It is our choice. It is that simple for most, and yet that difficult for some. Make a difference in your practice, in your family and in many others lives by choosing good ethics for your life.

Behold the evolution of backing up your data!

In the early 1990's, with DOS, you purchased special backup software that would let you copy your data across several floppy disks. You remember floppy disks, right? Backing up your data could take ten or fifteen minutes and required you to babysit the entire process. A back up failure was not uncommon. So much so that you would usually try to restore the data from your collection of floppy disks to make sure it worked, which took another ten to fifteen minutes.

In the mid 1990's you moved to the tape drive, which was a definite step up from floppy disks. You didn't have to babysit the process. But, dependability was iffy. And tape cassettes were delicate items. Too much heat or humidity was bad. And the data seemed to become less readable over long periods of time.

In the late 1990's you saw the introduction of the Zip drive. Basically a non-floppy disk that could hold more data, it required it's own special drive. If you were lucky, or if you splurged, you could fit all of your data on just one zip drive. Usually, you needed special backup software to span two or more zip drives. Dependability was slightly better. The convenience factor was huge.

In the new century, thumb drives made their debut. Now you could quickly copy your data from your computer to a thumb drive, throw it in your purse or put in your pocket and that's that. Dependability is good. Cost is down. Data security remains a huge problem (not just for thumb drives but for any data storage device you take from your office). If that thumb drive disappears you've a lot to explain to your patients.

And today, the cloud is the rage. You never worry about backing up your data. With a cloud-based management system, like Curve Dental, your data is already on the cloud, which means it's backed up with every keystroke and change of data in multiple locations. The cloud is a much better answer to HIPAA concerns and disaster recovery plans.Wow, we've come a long ways.

If you're still using fossil fuel software, the kind you have to install, maintain, upgrade, and worry about backups, then it's time to evolve, just like everything else. Move your practice from decades-old technology to the cloud by chatting with one of our dental software consultants at 888-910-4376. Call today to learn more or visit our website.

Where does the dentist get her gas? At the filling station!

Socio-economic status plays a role in one's oral health. 33% of low income adults have untreated decay, compared to 16% for middle and higher income adults.