One of the main difference between the In Hand Dental and Dental Monitoring (DM) dental platform is that In Hand Dental uses real people to monitor and interact with clients, while DM uses artificial intelligence. The AI makes DM more expensive, but we’re not convinced it makes it better.
People Build Relationships, Relationships Build Practices
Some efficiencies are gained with AI, but having real staff receive and send messages gives you the chance to develop real and lasting human relationships with your patients. When patients are in the office setting up the In Hand Dental app on their phones, they meet the staff who will be responding to their messages. Over the course of virtual treatment, patients get to know and become friends with them, far outweighing the impersonal AI interactions you get with DM.
These personal relationships are crucial to a practice’s growth. Strong, growth-oriented practices are to be built on a foundation of positive human interaction. When a patient receives an automated message from DM saying “Go” or “No Go,” they will feel a loss of confidence, or control in the process. This will either cause them to reach out and communicate with your office, or erode their confidence should they remain silent.
AI Can’t Troubleshoot
Both In Hand Dental and DM rely on the patient taking photos and submitting them for evaluation. IHD sends those images straight to a designated staff member who then responds to the patient, either reassuring them that everything is going well, or prompting them for more information. AI does not significantly reduce the workload, nor does AI add value to the patient experience. It can identify a lot of problems, but to resolve them - that will always take a human touch.
When we talk about staff responding to the patient, we aren’t typically talking about the doctor. To work at your highest efficiency, each office should designate virtual clinical assistants (VCA) to monitor their remote app “dashboard.” The VCA does the daily work of monitoring and responding. The doctor only needs to look at the Dashboard when prompted by the VCA, typically only once a month. In fact, the doctor might delegate 99% of virtual visits.
Imagine the amount of Doctor time saved - and what you might do with that extra chair time.
Time Saved - And Quality Gained
DM reps might tell you the DM dashboard only needs 15 minutes of your attention per day for each 100 patients monitored. But with DM, you’re leaving your patients in the hands of an artificial intelligence system that won’t increase your patient’s sense of partnership in their aligner treatment.
With In Hand Dental, dental practices have reported that it takes only 20-30 minutes per day for 200 patients because the system sends notifications about which patients have sent photos, asked questions or are late changing their aligners.
Many offices have their VCA do evening and weekend replies as well. It may take 10 minutes in an evening or on the weekend to respond to inquiries as they roll in and patients love it. It’s a reply from someone they know and trust during times that they historically would be unable to ask questions. That kind of service gives complete patient satisfaction.
In Hand Dental Needs Less Equipment & It’s Faster to Onboard
The Dental Monitoring system includes an expensive and cumbersome “scan box” that the patient uses to take their progress photos. Based on feedback from our partners, simple cheek retractors, and the patient’s smart phone work well with the In Hand Dental platform to monitor and manage treatment plans. The In Hand Dental system requires no extra equipment for staff or patients to learn to use.
This also means that training your staff is faster with In Hand Dental. You can get your entire office staff completely set up with the In Hand Dental remote monitoring system in about one and a half hours with a Zoom call instead of wasting two or more days, as required when incorporating the DM system.
Less expensive
DM wants you to put every patient in your practice on their system. That often means including all your traditional braces patients, which can run your monthly bill into the thousands. Even with just aligner patients, DM is 7-10 times more expensive than In Hand Dental.
In Hand Dental is scalable for small and large practices alike, and allows you to implement it on as many or as few patients as you like – granting doctors a robust and flexible service.
One doctor compared the prices of putting his patients on DM versus In Hand Dental:
Firstly, In Hand Dental gives you the choice of how many patients you want to put on the dental platform, while DM requests that you put all of them (can impact prices).
For this particular doctor, putting his aligner patients on In Hand Dental would cost him $399/month.
Dental Monitoring would cost him around $3,200/month. If he put all his patients on DM, it would cost twice that. Chair time is money, and In Hand Dental can free up hours and hours or chair time for a fraction of the cost of DM.
Get the Best of Both Worlds
DM claims that their AI feature means everything gets logged automatically, but the In Hand Dental dashboard functions in the same way. It automatically logs all events performed and notifies you of overdue actions, so nothing is missed. In addition to that, it also improves patient engagement and saves you chair time. When a patient needs an answer to a question, having a live person interact with them builds patient confidence in the process and increases their sense that they’re really partnering with you on their treatment. This is how you grow a practice: on the relationships you build between patients and staff.
Want to know how a dental platform can help your practice? Contact In Hand Dental and start improving your practice and build more relationships with your patients today!