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OVERVIEW
Drilling Down on Efficiency: Simplifying the Dental Procurement Process
Empowering dental practices with a smarter, faster way to source and manage their supplies
Role
User Research
Product Strategy
End-to-end Design
UX/ UI
Team
1 PM
4 Software Engineers
2 QA Engineers
1 Data Analyst
Duration
4 months
Sector
DSMS
Healthcare/ Medical
Wholesale Supply + Distribution
B2B SaaS E-commerce
MENU
Overview
Orders
Inventory
Reports
Admin
Locations
BROWSE
Products
Vendors
TEAM
Me
Ms. Gonzalez
Dr. Krasinski
SUPPORT
Resolutions
Help Center
Search products, vendors, SKUs, or order history
AK
Recent Orders
View Orders
617294
617198
617784
619492
Dec 1, 2024
Nov 26, 2024
Nov 15, 2024
Nov 4, 2024
$250.25
$128.45
$452.30
$1,029.90
Pending
Shipped
Completed
Completed
Total Spent Weekly
View Reports
$500
$1,000
$1,500
Nov 4
Nov 11
Nov 18
Nov 25
Dec 2
Dec 9
Past 6 weeks
Previous report
Inventory
View Inventory
56 Items In Stock
7 Items Low Stock
8 Items Out of Stock
Add items to cart
Quick Actions
Track Orders
Reorder Items
Create Bundle
Restocked Items
New Products
Usage Trends
Savings Insights
Top Purchased
Overview
New Order
PROBLEM STATEMENT
The Tooth of the Matter
As the company scaled beyond 10,000 dental clinics, systemic issues in the procurement flow began to surface. Clinics frequently submitted incorrect or incomplete orders due to unclear SKU details, inconsistent validation logic, and a fragmented cart experience. This directly impacted fulfillment efficiency, increased operational overhead, and led to a measurable spike in customer support volume.
Redesigning the procurement flow was a critical opportunity to reduce ordering friction, drive repeat purchasing behavior, and create a more resilient system that could scale with the business. I led this initiative from problem framing through execution, aligning product, engineering, and ops around a shared goal: improving order accuracy and streamlining the end-to-end purchasing experience.
Limitations of the current platform often led to:
Insufficient Workflows
Staff waste time searching through multiple suppliers.
Inventory Confusion
Overstock or understock of critical items like dental tools, materials, and medications.
No Price Comparison
Difficulty comparing pricing and vendor offerings at scale.
OBJECTIVES
Filling In the Gaps
To support the platform’s rapid growth, our objective was to redesign the procurement experience to be scalable, intuitive, and compliant. The core goals were to:
Streamline ordering workflows to reduce errors, minimize support volume, and shorten time-to-checkout
Enable multi-vendor purchasing in a single flow, improving operational efficiency for clinics managing dozens of suppliers
Improve price transparency and inventory clarity, particularly for frequently reordered and regulated items
Design for speed, simplicity, and security while maintaining full compliance with HIPAA, PCI DSS, ADA, GDPR, and relevant state-level regulations
MULTIMODAL FEATURES
Smiles Across Modalities
Barcode Scanning
Users can scan barcodes on dental products, enabling instant identification and auto-fill of product details without manual search or typing.
Reduces errors and streamlines the reorder process for busy clinic staff managing inventory in real time.
Voice Search
Clinics can use voice commands to search for products or navigate key workflows to reorder supplies and check stock availability.
Makes hands-free operation possible in hygienic or multitasking environments where keyboard use is impractical.
Touch Navigation
Supports intuitive touch gestures like swipe-to-reorder, drag-and-drop cart organization, and long-press for quick product information.
Reduces cognitive load and speed up day-to-day operations for procurement managers.
TRADEOFFS + CONSTRAINTS
No Sugar Added
The product had to balance regulatory rigor with usability at scale, supporting thousands of clinics with varying technical literacy while meeting enterprise procurement standards.
We initially considered offering users custom workflows for each role (dentist, office manager, procurement staff), but given the project timeline, we focused more on implementing a unified approval flow to ensure faster development and a smoother launch.
The platform also needed to integrate with existing vendor APIs, which limited the flexibility of product categorization. We prioritized usability and ease of navigation over the ability to fully customize vendor categories.
APPROACH
The Extraction
I structured the project into three key phases.
1. Discovery
User Research
Interviews
Competitive Analysis
Heuristic Analysis
Market Trends
Consumer Behaviors
2. Ideation
Strategy Development
Key Solution Elements
Brainstorming Findings
User Flows
Iterative Testing
Feedback Sessions
3. Design
Wireframes
Collaborative Iteration
Accessibility Considerations
Edge Cases
Prototypes
Final Usability Testing
JOURNEY MAPPING
The Patient Path Through the Root Canal
This map visualizes pain points in the multi-role dental procurement process—especially the approval flow between staff and dentists. It helped prioritize friction-reducing features and shape our collaboration strategy.
USER RESEARCH
Reality Bytes
The core users of the dental supply platform are dental office managers, procurement staff, and dentists- each playing a critical role in the dental supply chain. While their responsibilities vary, their workflows intersect around a shared goal: ensuring timely, accurate, and cost-effective procurement of essential supplies without disrupting patient care. Through interviews and contextual inquiry, we identified key patterns:
Office Managers:
Orchestrating Daily Operations
Office managers are the operational backbone of the clinic, balancing inventory oversight, vendor coordination, and training staff. Their biggest friction comes from fragmented systems. They need a centralized, error-resistant system to reduce redundancy and ensure essential supplies are always in stock.
Procurement Staff:
Driving Cost and Inventory Efficiency
Procurement teams focus on high-volume ordering and cost control. Their pain points stem from lack of visibility across vendors, time-consuming price comparisons, and the absence of forecasting tools. These users require data-rich interfaces that enable smart purchasing decisions and tighter inventory alignment.
Dentists:
Uninterrupted Patient Care
Though not primary purchasers, dentists often approve key supplies and flag urgent needs. Their concerns center on supply availability and quality, especially during procedures. They need lightweight, high-trust interfaces for approvals and emergency reorders, without being pulled into operational complexity.
Office Manager
"I need to reorder supplies quickly and without errors to ensure the office never runs out of essential items."
Responsibilities
Manage supply inventory and ensure timely ordering of essential materials
Coordinate with vendors for order delivery and track order statuses
Supervise the overall supply chain process, including budgeting and cost control
Train staff on how to use ordering systems and ensure proper inventory procedures are followed.
Needs
A quick, error-free way to reorder essential supplies
Centralized view of inventory across all departments
Smart reminders or low-stock alerts
Clear vendor information and pricing
Goals
Streamline vendor communication and order history
Maintain smooth day-to-day operations by minimizing downtime due to missing supplies or managing reorders
Pain Points
➜ Dealing with fragmented vendor systems and tracking multiple spreadsheets for inventory management ➜ Managing inventory manually using spreadsheets ➜ Placing duplicate or missed orders due to lack of visibility ➜ Limited clarity on product availability or delivery timelines
Key Insight
Office Managers are juggling multiple responsibilities and need an intuitive, centralized system that automates reordering and tracks inventory in real-time.
Procurement Staff
"I need to track bulk orders efficiently so I can manage inventory levels and keep costs in check."
Responsibilities
Oversee bulk ordering and stock management for larger dental practices
Compare vendor pricing, inventory availability, and negotiate better deals
Maintain inventory levels and ensure supplies are ordered before running out
Track orders and deliveries to ensure timely availability of supplies
Needs
Ability to compare pricing and availability across multiple vendors
Easy-to-read bulk order summaries and historical data
Forecasting tools for smarter purchasing decisions
Integration with inventory tracking systems
Goals
Ensure a steady supply of inventory while minimizing excess stock and keeping costs under control.
Pain Points
➜ Complex workflows across different vendor systems ➜ Difficulty keeping stock levels optimized (either over- or understocking) ➜ Time-consuming comparisons for bulk orders ➜ Lack of automation or alerts for restocking
Key Insight
Procurement teams need visibility and control over purchasing data to make high-volume, cost-effective decisions and minimize operational risks.
Dentist
" I need to approve supplies quickly so I can continue delivering top-quality care without interruptions."
Responsibilities
Approve necessary supplies for procedures, ensuring high-quality materials are used
Review stock levels and communicate any critical inventory shortages to the office manager
Collaborate with the office manager on special requests or custom orders
Ensure the practice runs smoothly by having all required tools and supplies available for patient care
Needs
Visibility into product quality and reviews
Confidence that necessary, high quality tools and supplies are always available
Simple interface to easily and quickly approve or flag needed items
Fast reordering for emergency or high-use items
Goals
Ensure high-quality care by approving the best supplies available without delays.
Pain Points
➜ Interruptions during procedures due to supply shortages ➜ Limited time and say in supply decisions despite being primary users ➜ Unclear information on quality or origin of supplies ➜ Lack of input into the procurement cycle
Key Insight
Dentists want assurance and control, even in a secondary role—they benefit most from a seamless supply chain that doesn’t interfere with patient care.
THE DISCOVERY PROCESS
User Interviews
Identified inefficiencies in procurement, inventory handling, and recurring user frustrations.
Competitive + Heuristic Analysis
Analyzed existing dental supply platforms and identified gaps in UX, product offerings, and backend systems.
Market Trends
Researched industry trends to align design decisions with market needs and business opportunities.
COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS
Scaling the Competition
The B2B dental supply space is saturated with legacy platforms and vertical SaaS providers offering a mix of procurement, inventory, and vendor management features. While most solutions support basic bulk ordering and price comparisons, they often fall short on usability, flexibility, and integration depth — particularly for growing practices with evolving procurement structures.
Competitive Analysis
To inform product strategy, I conducted a competitive audit of key players, assessing both functional coverage and user experience maturity. This analysis revealed three consistent gaps across the landscape:
Limited vendor interoperability: Most platforms lacked seamless multi-vendor support, forcing clinics to juggle parallel workflows and UIs.
Rigid workflows: Customization for clinic size, approval processes, and inventory rules was either non-existent or locked behind complex configurations.
UX fragmentation: Critical tasks like bulk ordering, inventory tracking, and order status visibility were often buried behind unintuitive navigation or required redundant inputs.
Heuristic Analysis
To complement the market scan, I also performed a heuristic evaluation on 4 leading platforms, focusing on navigation clarity, system feedback, and error prevention. This surfaced specific friction points such as:
Poor categorization of high-volume consumables, leading to repeated search fatigue
Unclear system states during ordering (e.g., pending vs. confirmed vs. shipped)
Lack of confirmation safeguards for large orders, increasing the risk of costly mistakes
Building Differentiated Value
These insights directly shaped early design hypotheses — particularly around streamlined approval flows, progressive disclosure for bulk actions, and role-specific interfaces — enabling us to build differentiated value into the platform from day one.
Key Gaps
How The New Platform Differentiates
Ineffective Vendor Comparison:
Inconsistent integration with vendors often leads to fragmented product data, pricing discrepancies, and extra steps to complete an order— reducing trust and efficiency. Many platforms also lack a clear and effective vendor and price comparison tool.
Vendor + Price Comparison:
Offers a dynamic price comparison tool that allows users to compare prices, delivery times, and reviews from multiple suppliers for the same product. This feature directly addresses a pain point for many dental clinics looking to save time and money.
No Multi-location Support:
There’s a lack of robust multi-location support for larger dental groups or chains. This is especially relevant for practices with several clinics.
Multi-location Support:
Enables multi-location support for dental groups and chain practices, allowing them to manage supplies for each location from a single account with permissions for each team member.
Insufficient Inventory Management:
Lacks a well functioning inventory management system that alerts users to low stock, reorder points, and provides accurate tracking could be a valuable addition.
Easy Inventory Management:
Introduces a real-time inventory management system with features like low-stock alerts, reordering suggestions, and automatic replenishment based on historical usage.
Fragmented Vendor Communication:
Users must contact each vendor individually to resolve issues, which leads to fragmented communication, delays, and duplicated efforts.
Centralized Issue Resolution:
Provides an in-platform help desk where users can report issues (e.g. missing items, delayed shipments) and communicate directly with vendors, all from one dashboard.
No Approval Workflow:
Most platforms assume that a single user is placing the orders, without role-based permissions or multi-step approval flows. This leads to untracked purchases, duplicate errors, budget mismanagement, and lack of transparency around which staff member placed orders.
Built-In Approval Workflow:
Office managers and procurement staff can browse, add items to the cart, and save orders as drafts. The dentist must review and approve the cart before finalizing the purchase. Ensures clinical oversight, cost control, accountability, matching the workflows in dental offices.
Poor Overall User Experience:
Many existing platforms are clunky or outdated. This design capitalizes on simplicity, clarity, and modern UI elements, offering a more intuitive experience.
Modern and Intuitive Interface:
An intuitive, modern platform that simplifies the product discovery process. Provides easy-to-navigate filters, a seamless ordering system, and clear, visual dashboards for inventory and order management.
MARKET TRENDS
Bracing for Change
Finally, I researched macro-level market trends — including the rise of multi-location dental groups, increasing reliance on digital procurement platforms, and growing pressure for cost-efficiency — to ensure the product direction aligns with industry shifts and business priorities.
Key Market Trends
Rise of Multi-Location Dental Groups
In 2023, 10% of dentists worked in practices with 100 or more locations, and 2% worked in practices with 50–99 locations. Additionally, affiliated locations increased by 45-50% over the past three years.
Increasing Reliance on Digital Platforms
60% of dental groups reported that their supply spend is between 4% to 6% of revenue, with 20% spending 7% to 9%. Implementing an e-procurement platforms helps DSOs track compliance with clinical formularies and monthly budgets.
Growing Pressure for Cost-Efficiency
Decreasing supply spend by just 1% can increase EBITDA by 4% to 6%. DSOs are increasingly adopting AI and technology to optimize procurement processes and improve margins.
US Market Trends
US Market Trends
While specific market data for dental supply management platforms is limited, the U.S. dental practice management software market is projected to grow from $780M in 2022 to $1.6B by 2030 — indicating a strong trend toward digitization in dental operations. This growth reflects an increasing demand for software tools that streamline supply and inventory workflows.
Global Market Growth of DPMS
2023 - The global DPMS market was valued at approximately $2.6 billion.
2024 - Growth to $2.89 billion.
2025 - Projected to reach $3.18 billion.
2030 - Forecasted to surpass $4.67 billion, with a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 9.9%.
2034 - Expected to attain $7.71 billion, maintaining a CAGR of 10.2% from 2025.
US Market Trends
2023 - The US DPMS market was valued at approximately $851.4 million.
2024 - Growth to $830 million was observed.
2030 - Projected to reach $1.768 billion, with a CAGR of 8.8%.
2034 - Expected to surpass $2.25 billion, growing at a CAGR of 10.49% from 2025.
DESIGN PRINCIPLES
Key Solution Elements for Users
Product Information Transparency
Dentists and clinic managers could now process orders faster, reducing supply chain errors.
Builds trust by ensuring dental clinics can make informed purchasing decisions that meet their regulatory and ethical standards.
Centralized Issue Resolution
Provides an in-platform help desk where users can report issues (e.g. missing items, delayed shipments) and communicate directly with vendors, all from one dashboard.
Reduces the back-and-forth of managing issues across multiple vendors. Centralizing support saves time, ensures accountability, and improves trust.
Built-In Approval Workflow
Office managers and procurement staff can browse, add items to the cart, and save orders as drafts. The dentist must review and approve the cart before finalizing the purchase.
Ensures clinical oversight, cost control, accountability, matching the workflows in dental offices.
One-Click Reordering
Allows users to quickly restock commonly used products
Saves time and reduces friction in the buying process, ensuring that dental practices can maintain their inventory without hassle.
Intuitive Search and Filters
Advanced search functionality with filters for product type, brand, and regulatory compliance.
Enables users to find exactly what they need quickly, improving efficiency and reducing the risk of ordering the wrong product.
Customizable Order Bundles
A feature that allows users to create customized product bundles for recurring needs.
Simplifies inventory management and ensures clinics never run out of essential items, leading to smoother operations.
DESIGN PRINCIPLES
Key Solution Elements for Stakeholders
Sales Insights and Analytics
A data-driven insights dashboard that tracks purchasing trends, product demand, and sales performance.
Offers stakeholders key business insights to optimize products, inventory, and pricing strategies, identify best-sellers and trends, and enable targeted marketing to boost sales and revenue.
Supplier Management Tools
Easily manage relationships with multiple suppliers, track inventory levels, and negotiate bulk pricing.
Streamlines operations for stakeholders, enabling them to make informed decisions about suppliers and maintain a competitive edge, increasing profit margins and reducing overhead costs, ultimately leading to higher revenue.
Dynamic Pricing Engine
A flexible pricing model that adjusts product prices based on demand, seasonality, and market trends.
Increases revenue by allowing stakeholders to maximize pricing opportunities while remaining competitive in the market.
Customizable Reporting
Generate custom reports on sales, orders, customer preferences, and inventory turnover.
Offers flexibility to analyze data in ways that support better decision-making for both short-term and long-term business goals, allowing stakeholders to make data-informed decisions to improve sales performance and identify potential areas for growth.
Compliance and Regulatory Tracking
A built-in compliance tracker that ensures all products meet industry regulations and certifications, and provides necessary documentation for audits.
Protects stakeholders from legal and financial risks by ensuring that all products meet regulatory requirements before being sold to dental clinics.
Subscription Model for Recurring Orders
A subscription option for dental clinics to set up regular orders for frequently used products (e.g., consumables, gloves, dental kits).
Generates steady, predictable revenue streams, while ensuring the dental clinic remains stocked with necessary supplies and reducing churn.
DESIGN PRINCIPLES
Brushing Up on What Matters
Order #
Order Date
Vendor
Total
Status
My Orders
617294
617198
617784
619492
610081
612093
613117
619012
619015
610918
Dec 1, 2024
Nov 26, 2024
Nov 15, 2024
Nov 4, 2024
Oct 27, 2024
Oct 16, 2024
Oct 8, 2024
Sep 30, 2024
Sep 18, 2024
Sep 12, 2024
Dentex Supply Co.
ProMolar Supplies
Apex Dental Lab
Smilestone Solutions
BrightByte Distributers
Crown & Root Co.
Medental Direct
Enamel Essentials
Oracare Wholesale
Incisor Imports
$250.25
$128.45
$452.30
$1,029.90
$0.00
$2,348.50
$317.75
$589.60
$4,112.45
$933.20
Pending
Shipped
Completed
Completed
Cancelled
Completed
Completed
Completed
Completed
Completed
Filters
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New Order
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Ms. Gonzalez
Dr. Krasinski
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Search by order #, date, vendor, or status
AK
Streamlining the Ordering Process
Built-in features like one-click reorders, purchase history suggestions, and product bundling make it easy for clinics to restock frequently used items.
Why It Matters: Dental clinics often reorder the same essential supplies. Reducing the time and effort to do so improves operational efficiency, encourages repeat usage, and keeps the supply chain running smoothly.
Empowering Users Through Transparency
Providing users with clear information about product manufacturers, material quality, and regulatory compliance builds trust and helps dental clinics make informed, responsible purchasing decisions.
Why It Matters: Transparency around suppliers, materials, and certifications ensures clinics can maintain high standards of care, comply with regulations, and avoid costly mistakes—all while building long-term trust in the platform.
Designing with the Dental Workflow in Mind
The platform is tailored to the daily routines of dental professionals—balancing clinical demands with inventory management through intuitive layouts and quick actions.
Why It Matters: Designing in context ensures the platform complements, rather than disrupts, how dental teams work. This leads to higher adoption rates and fewer usability issues.
Clarity Over Complexity
The interface uses visual hierarchy, clear labeling, and clean layouts to guide users effortlessly through complex purchasing flows.
Why It Matters: Busy dental teams don’t have time to decipher cluttered UIs. A clear and focused design supports quick decision-making and reduces the risk of errors.
EDGE CASES
Beyond the Surface: Deep Cleaning the Platform
In designing a robust dental e-commerce platform, I anticipated and accounted for a range of edge cases to ensure a seamless user experience across diverse scenarios — from complex order workflows to unusual user behaviors. Below is a breakdown of key edge cases, their potential issues, and how I addressed them.
FINAL USABILITY VALIDATION
Plaque-Free Performance
After building out the prototype, I conducted a final usability validation with dental professionals to validate the effectiveness of the design. This phase aimed to assess both the effectiveness and efficiency of the design, ensuring it met user needs and aligned with operational goals.
Key Tests
Task-Based Testing
Users were asked to complete key tasks (e.g., order supplies, re-order, and compare products) while I observed their interaction.
Surveys
I collected feedback on ease of use, clarity, and overall satisfaction.
Key insights from the usability testing led to several iterative design improvements:
Simplified Order Flow: Users found the initial multi-step bulk ordering process too complex. We iterated on this by consolidating steps, resulting in a 40% reduction in order completion time.
Inventory Visibility: Feedback revealed that real-time stock tracking wasn’t as intuitive as expected. We refined the UI to provide clearer visual cues for stock status, which increased user confidence in the system by more than 30%.
Error Prevention: Users encountered issues with accidental duplicate orders. We addressed this by introducing smart alerts and an order confirmation step, leading to more than 35% decrease in ordering errors.
Overall, the validation phase highlighted several critical refinements that directly impacted user satisfaction and operational efficiency. The final product saw an 85% reduction in user-reported issues from the initial test phase, contributing to a 20% increase in clinic adoption within the first three months of rollout.
“This would seriously save me hours every week.”
“I love how everything’s in one place—I don’t have to dig through five tabs just to reorder gloves.”
RESULTS
The Final Crown
After multiple rounds of refinement informed by usability feedback and stakeholder input, I prepared a comprehensive design handoff for engineering — including responsive specs, user flows, edge case documentation, and interaction guidelines to ensure implementation accuracy.
Post-handoff, I collaborated closely with developers during QA and pre-launch to maintain design integrity and address technical constraints without compromising UX.
The platform launched successfully, delivering measurable improvements across key procurement workflows. These outcomes validated the platform’s emphasis on speed, accuracy, and streamlined reordering, significantly improving day-to-day operations for dental practices.
Increased Efficiency
Dentists and clinic managers could now process orders faster, reducing supply chain errors.
Cost Savings
Transparent pricing and vendor comparison allowed for better budgeting and savings.
Customer Satisfaction
By focusing on user needs, we improved retention rates and built trust among dental professionals.