Patient experiences and outcomes play an important role in the success of dental practices and organizations. Creating the best experience possible can lead to more patients and revenue.
These 17 industry leaders shared their best strategies to improve experiences and outcomes. The executives featured in this article are speaking at the Becker's The Future of Dentistry Roundtable, set for June 15-16 at the Swissotel in Chicago.
To learn more about this event, click here.
If you would like to join as a speaker, contact Randi Haseman at rhaseman@beckershealthcare.com.
As part of an ongoing series, Becker's is talking to healthcare leaders who will speak at our roundtable.
Question: What strategies can dental practices implement to improve patient experience and outcomes?
Zerita Buchanan, DDS. Dentist at Dental Dreams (Lithonia, Ga.): To improve patient experience and outcomes, dental practices need to actively recruit, retain and support culturally competent and diverse providers and staff.
Mark Cannon, DDS. President of Associated Dental Specialists (Long Grove, Ill.): Successful businesses would often state "the customer is always right" and the most successful dental practices would be those that had a patient focus. What does that mean for future dental ventures? It requires the dental team to be patient centric, giving the patient the education and the support to create a lifetime relationship. How is that done in today’s society?
Manu Chaudhry, DDS. President of Capitol Dental Care (Salem, Ore.): We are navigating the age of intensified consumerism within a depressed economy. This has grown more fundamentally complex across wealth disparities. Outcomes are loosely defined: Is this increasing same store sales, or is this patient achieving a lifetime of oral health? For the greater good of humanity, it should and can be both. A few strategies for 2023 are: Communicate "health first" and better health outcomes for patients served in our care, demonstrate and communicate "leading with the heart" with our teams and extend this to our patients, stand by your diagnosis and recommended treatment plan. Finally, treat each other as humans.
Chelsey Coonan. Director of Operations and Sales for Uniform Teeth (Spain): It's as simple as starting with a survey sent to each patient after a visit asking for a net promoter score. This is a question from 1 to 10 asking the patient how was their experience and an opportunity to leave a comment.
Many patients often leave a comment, and from there you are able to detect what you can improve or learn from in an appointment. You couple this practice with reaching out to any patient that rates you below a nine score. Letting the patient know you are looking to improve their experience so wondering if they would share more. People are always willing to share!
Brett Gilbert, DDS. Endodontist and Owner of King Endodontics (Niles, Ill.): The strategies dental practices can implement to improve patient experience and outcomes is to consider that expectations in today's world are key! The prognosis that we offer for our treatment plans should be considered "customer expectations" and we must provide accuracy in forecasting the outcomes of our procedures and standing behind them. Consideration of your patient's personal time is also so important in today's world. Scheduling appropriately so patients do not have to wait along with team building to improve your efficiency goes a long way. Patient feedback on their experience in your office, either verbally or by online reviews, can become a wonderful learning opportunity to improve the way you operate from the first patient contact to any follow up appointments. The more feedback we can receive and consider as learning, versus criticism, will help any dental practice rise to the top of the pack.
Richard Huot, DDS. CEO of Beachside Dental Consultants (Vero Beach, Fla.): The easiest way to improve patient experiences and outcomes is to establish a "culture of trust" from the first contact with a new patient in whatever manner that is.
It can be as simple as a friendly website, an electronic follow through after a new patient inquiry to your practice, and a new patient experience with outstanding customer service delivered at every "touchpoint" of the first visit.
Once patients feel comfortable in their new surroundings, then and only then should any extensive treatment be proposed to the patients, so as to not "overwhelm" that new patient, in the office's goal to provide comprehensive treatment.
First impressions count, and the office staff needs to familiarize themselves as to how the new patient is processing their new patient encounter by judicial use of situational awareness.
The old adage "nobody really cares how much you know until they know how much you care" applies here, and once the two way trust is established, then the office has permission from the new patient to proceed with treatment.
Cyrus Lee, DMD. CEO and Executive Dental Director of Permanente Dental Associates (Portland, Ore.): There are several strategies that dental practices can implement to improve patient experience and outcomes. Soliciting feedback from patients to identify areas for improvement and ensuring the practices are meeting patient needs is a good place to start. We have a dental patient engagement council to help with this, but even a smaller practice can have a less formal mechanism of partnering with patients to get their input. Any processes that help enhance clear communication is key to ensuring a positive patient experience. Whether it's written after-visit summaries with explanations and next steps, having treatment coordinators, or training and alignment of staff around explanation of procedures, answering questions, and addressing concerns — the more clear and effective the communication to patients, the better their experience and compliance, which would improve overall outcomes.
Christopher Lugo, DMD. CEO of Dynamic Dental Management (Marysville, Wash.): Invest in your people but harness the new technologies available to dental offices. Machine learning platforms like OpenAI and Bard by Google will help streamline the patient's journey and can help augment repetitive daily tasks.
Jennifer Mallon. Chief Development Officer of Lone Peak Dental Group (Denver): There are many strategies a dental practice can do to improve patient experience and outcomes. (1) Building a great culture and reducing staff turnover to provide consistency and familiarity for patients. Patients will also be happier if the staff is happy. (2) Establishing a consistent process for appointment confirmation. (3) Providing quality care by establishing a clinical audit system and continuing education program for doctors.
Gabriele Maycher. Dental Practice Management Consultant of GEM Dental Experts (Canada): Having worked in the dental industry for more than 30 years with many contributing roles, the best strategies a dental practice can implement to improve patient experience and outcomes is an optimized hygiene department. It is, after all, the epicenter of every practice.
Abhishek Nagaraj, DDS. Co-founder and Co-CEO of Areo Dental Group (Chicago): Creating amazing patient experiences starts with answering the phones with a smile as it's often the first point of contact with a potential new patient. Being transparent with great non-judgmental communication, impactful treatment presentation by having people see their intraoral pictures (seeing is believing) to understand the gravity of their oral condition can go a long way in establishing trust. Lastly, flexible financing options, convenient scheduling and prompt follow ups can enhance the patient experience even further by showing patients they will get the best care right here.
Naimish Patel. Founder and CEO of Vidya Capital (Bloomfield Hills, Mich.): Improving the patient experience often comes down to improving the team members' experience in the office. Too often we focus on patient gadgets and gizmos, but focusing on improving office team members' experience will translate to a better experience for patients. Living by the adage that happy team members will lead to happy patients is a proven path to a better patient experience.
Dr. Aalok Shukla. CEO of Uplift Health (United Kingdom): Digital patient journey: dental practices that offer a digital patient journey that enables a frictionless experience will be chosen more; digital dental plans: practices that offer affordable dental plans can increase the number of patients they attract, and this can be packaged nicely to local companies; using AI to enhance the patient experience: By using personalized messages, videos and follow-ups created with AI a high touch consistent experience can be delivered.
Leah Sigler. President of The TeleDentists (Kansas City, Mo.): Dental practices should start adapting the newest dental tool: teledentistry. By adding teledentistry, they are basically adding a virtual chair that can provide a new source of revenue for the practice, while expanding access for patients (new and current). Patients are looking for virtual care to avoid unnecessary office visits, and practices can offer teledental consultations without wasting chair time and PPE, but still give value-based care to improve patient outcomes.
Robert Trager, DDS. Dentist at JFK Airport (New York City): The best strategy is to make sure that you hire a front desk person who answers the phone — whether it's for a new, current or established patient — who articulates well. This person must have a caring, kind and concerning attitude to the caller. This person should explain and reveal all office protocols for making/canceling appointments and their financial responsibilities. This also includes explaining to the patients what their dental benefit plan allows as far as deductibles, co-payment(s) and what is allowed for different procedures and their time limits. The best outcome is for the front desk person to call the patient that night or the next day to see how they are doing especially after a difficult extraction or procedure to let them know that we are here to assist and to come in if needed and to contact us immediately if necessary.
Jordan Trentacosta. Head of Analytics of United Dental Corp. (Miami): Patient surveys are very prominent already, but the real value comes from what you do with the resulting data. If you ask questions that are tied to actionable items, the business can be set up to thrive. For example, instead of asking patients to rate their visit on a scale from 1 to 5, create custom questions that revolve around the company's expectations for patient experience. Ask things like "Did someone greet you when you walked in?" "Were you escorted to the operatory by a team member?" "Did your provider answer all your questions?" etc. — whatever is truly important to you. Once you see those results, you can pinpoint where additional training is needed.
Thomas von Sydow. COO of Cornerstone Group (Irvine, Calif.): I am a huge fan of clinicians doing end-of-the-day care calls. This does not have to be all patients. However, if you performed any significant procedure like a crown, that patient should be called.