Guides · Case log
How to keep a dental case log
Your case log is the proof of your clinical years: for requirements, for your supervisor, and later for your CV, a specialty application or a job. Here is what to record, and how to keep it so it's still useful in five years.
What to record for every case
Write it at the chair or the same day. A case written up a week later is missing half its details.
| Date and clinic | When and where, so the case can be found and dated for a logbook. |
|---|---|
| Patient reference | The clinic's file number or your own code. Never the patient's full name in a personal log. |
| Department and procedure | For example Endodontics, root canal treatment. Use your faculty's own names, so the case counts toward the right requirement. |
| Tooth | In the numbering your faculty uses, plus surfaces or canals where they matter. |
| Medical history alerts | Allergies, anticoagulants, diabetes, pregnancy: anything that changes how you treat the patient next visit. |
| What you did, step by step | Anaesthesia, isolation, materials and their brands or shades, working lengths, complications. |
| Photos and radiographs | Pre-op, during and final, the same views each time. |
| Supervisor | Who checked it, and their signature or approval if your faculty requires one. |
| Next step | What comes next and when. This is the line that stops a patient falling through the cracks. |
Keep it private
- Use a file number or a code, not the patient's name, in anything you carry around.
- Don't keep clinical photos in your gallery or class WhatsApp groups. They sync to personal clouds and get forwarded.
- Anything you share (a seminar slide, a post, a portfolio) should carry no name, no face without consent, and nothing that identifies the patient.
- Follow your faculty's and your country's rules on patient data. They come before any of this.
Notebook, spreadsheet or app?
| Paper notebook | Fast and allowed everywhere. But it can't hold photos, can't be searched, can't count your requirements, and it's gone if you lose it. |
|---|---|
| Spreadsheet | Searchable and easy to total. But it's slow to fill in at the chair, photos live somewhere else, and it rarely gets updated after the first month. |
| Case log app | Fast at the chair, keeps photos with the case, counts requirements and reminds you of follow-ups. Check that it works offline, keeps photos private, and lets you export everything, so you're never locked in. |
Turn the log into something
A good log is more than a list. The same cases become a clinical case report, the slides for your seminar, the logbook your faculty asks for, and the cases on your CV. That only works if each case has its photos, its steps and its dates from the start.
How OnlyTeeth does it
OnlyTeeth is a case log made for dental students. Pick the department, the procedure and the tooth and the case is logged in under a minute. Add the rest step by step, or say it out loud and voice logging fills it in. Photos are filed under the case by stage. Medical alerts from the history show in red every time you open the case. Every visit sits on one timeline with what's next. It works with no signal.
- Free: unlimited cases and photos, camera and shade guides, medical alerts, requirements for one department, and export to a spreadsheet, a photo ZIP and a single-case PDF.
- Premium: cloud backup across your phones, the full logbook, presentations, your CV and portfolio, voice logging and requirements for every department.
New accounts get 30 days of Premium free. Your cases are always yours: on any plan you can read and export everything, and there is no cap on how many you keep.
Questions
Is a case log the same as a logbook?
Close. The case log is your full record of each case. The logbook is the summary your faculty asks for, usually a table of dates, procedures and supervisor signatures. If the log is complete, the logbook can be produced from it.
How much detail is enough?
Enough that a classmate could pick up the patient at the next visit: what was done, with what, and what's next.
Should I log cases I assisted on?
Yes, marked as assisted. They don't count toward most requirements, but they show the range of cases you have seen.
More guides: Tracking your requirements · App vs notebook vs spreadsheet · Intraoral photography with a phone · Shade photography