Becoming a dentist is no easy feat.

Trainee dentists complete five years at dental school before spending a further two years specialising in hospitals and practices. Then when they're fully qualified, they have to keep their skills up-to-date with continual professional development.  

You can't learn how to be a dentist sat in a lecture theatre. Lots of learning takes place in clinics, where trainees learn practical skills and treat patients under supervision. Trainees then need to prove their skills to qualify – which is where an eportfolio comes in.  

Instead of writing notes about how they performed a check-up, they can record themselves completing the check-up in the clinic. They can then upload this footage to their eportfolio as evidence to prove their skills. It's quick, authentic and stress-free.  

But that's not the only benefit. Here are our top 5 reasons for using an eportfolio for dentist training:

1. Anytime access

Trainee dentists travel between different hospitals and clinics, so paper portfolios can be cumbersome to carry around. And if a trainee forgets their portfolio, they won't be able to get their work signed off, so they'll have to post their work or even complete a unit again. 

But not with an eportfolio. Trainees can log in to their account from any computer wherever they are – in hospital, at the clinic or at home.

2. Paperfree 

Paper-based portfolios can be lost, damaged or stolen – which is not only inconvenient for candidates, they could contain sensitive patient information. With an eportfolio, all data is fully encrypted and cannot be lost, hacked or stolen.

3. Quality control

The General Dental Council (GDC) sets the standards for UK dental education and quality assures the whole process from start to finish. With an eportfolio, the full audit trail is recorded online and is visible to learners, mentors, IQAs and EQAs – making quality assurance easy to track, manage and maintain.

4. Huge savings 

If your trainee dentists use paper portfolios, printing, paper, travel and storage costs could run into the thousands. But if you use an eportfolio, you won’t have to print off reading lists, post assignments or store huge folders – everything is available online.

5. Futureproof

The learning never stops for dentists – they have to complete continual professional development throughout their whole career. If you use an eportfolio with a built-in CPD tracker, trainees can use the same platform to record how many hours of CPD they've completed each year.  

At OneFile, our eportfolio is designed to support dentists throughout their career – from initial training to annual renewals. That's why it's already used by healthcare centres across the country.  

To find out how you can use OneFile to deliver dental training – and how is can be used throughout a dentist's career – download our free guide.