Every dental practice should have a basic IT disaster recovery plan that explains which systems must be restored first, who is responsible, how backups will be recovered, and how the practice will operate while technology is unavailable.
A backup is important, but it is only one part of recovery.
For a dental practice with 10–40 employees, start with this five-part framework:
Prioritize → Assign → Recover → Communicate → Test
1. Prioritize Your Critical Systems
Not every system has the same importance during an outage.
Identify the technology employees need to continue patient care and business operations.
That may include:
- Dentrix, Open Dental, or Eaglesoft
- Dental imaging and Dexis
- Patient schedules
- Servers
- Internet connectivity
- Phones
- Microsoft 365 and email
- Workstations
- Backup systems
Then establish a recovery order.
For example, restoring access to the patient schedule may be more urgent than restoring a non-critical administrative application.
2. Assign Responsibilities Before an Emergency
Don't wait for an outage to decide who should call whom.
Your recovery plan should identify:
- Who contacts IT
- Who communicates with employees
- Who coordinates with dental software vendors
- Who contacts the internet or phone provider
- Who makes decisions about the patient schedule
- Who handles cybersecurity or compliance escalation when appropriate
Everyone doesn't need to understand the technical recovery process.
They do need to know who is responsible for what.
3. Know How Systems Will Be Recovered
Your practice should understand what happens after a serious failure.
Ask:
- Where are our backups?
- When were they last tested?
- Which systems can be restored first?
- What hardware or cloud resources would recovery require?
- Approximately how long could restoration take?
Recovery expectations should be established before a server fails or ransomware appears.
4. Plan How the Practice Will Communicate
Technology failures can affect more than computers.
If employees lose access to schedules, phones, email, or practice-management software, determine how the team will communicate.
Your plan should address questions such as:
- How will employees receive instructions?
- How will patients be contacted if necessary?
- Where are important vendor phone numbers stored?
- Can management reach IT if email is unavailable?
Keep important emergency contact information somewhere accessible even when primary systems are down.
5. Test the Plan
A recovery plan that has never been reviewed or tested may contain assumptions that don't work during a real emergency.
Periodically verify important parts of the plan.
That can include:
- Testing backups
- Reviewing contact information
- Confirming vendor responsibilities
- Checking recovery priorities
- Reviewing employee procedures
The goal isn't to predict every possible disaster.
The goal is to avoid inventing your recovery process during the disaster.
The 5-Question Dental Disaster Recovery Check
Ask these five questions:
- Which systems must we restore first?
- Who is responsible for coordinating recovery?
- When were our backups last tested?
- How long could we operate without our critical systems?
- Do employees know what to do during an IT outage?
If several answers are unclear, your practice may need a more complete recovery plan.
Backup vs. Disaster Recovery vs. Business Continuity
These terms are related, but they aren't identical.
Backup: Copies of important data.
Disaster recovery: How technology and data are restored after a disruption.
Business continuity: How the practice continues operating while recovery is happening.
A strong strategy considers all three.
The question isn't simply:
“Do we have backups?”
It's:
“How do we continue treating patients and get back to normal operations?”
Why Dental Practices Choose IT Services of Utah
IT Services of Utah has supported businesses for more than 30 years and works with dental practices throughout St. George and Washington County, Utah.
We can help practices evaluate:
- Backup and recovery
- Servers
- Network infrastructure
- Cybersecurity
- Ransomware preparedness
- Business continuity
- Dental technology
- Vendor coordination
Our internal support team also understands environments using Dentrix, Dexis, Open Dental, Eaglesoft, imaging systems, and other technology dental practices depend on.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is having backups enough for disaster recovery?
No. Backups provide copies of data. A recovery plan also addresses restoration priorities, responsibilities, communication, systems, and how the practice operates during the disruption.
What disasters should a dental practice plan for?
Planning should consider technology disruptions such as server failures, network or internet outages, cybersecurity incidents, hardware failures, and other events that could make critical systems unavailable.
How often should a disaster recovery plan be reviewed?
Review it periodically and whenever significant technology, vendors, locations, or business processes change.
Could Your Dental Practice Operate During an IT Emergency?
A useful disaster recovery plan doesn't need to be hundreds of pages.
Start with:
Prioritize. Assign. Recover. Communicate. Test.
For dental practices in St. George and Washington County, Utah, IT Services of Utah can help evaluate the technology, backups, and recovery processes your practice depends on.
Schedule a Dental Disaster Recovery Assessment with IT Services of Utah to identify recovery gaps before an IT emergency disrupts your patient schedule.
