For many dental practices, integrating a Remote monitoring system happened by accident. When the height of Covid closed dental offices and dentists and orthodontists weren’t able to see their patients in person, they tried many different ways of communicating (with varying degrees of success!).
Many practices implemented makeshift remote monitoring systems, or even just relied on non-HIPAA compliant methods of communication as a stopgap measure during covid closures. Because of this, they never established the proper foundation for remote monitoring for practice, both in terms of processes as well as integration with their staff.
Does this sound like something that happened to you or your practice?
One of the things stopping doctors from implementing a remote monitoring system into their practices today is that they worry about adding “one more thing” that might stress their overburdened staff….when actually the opposite is true.
For doctors that are using a HIPAA-compliant remote monitoring system, they are able to offer their overburdened staff a break.
There are several reasons why:
- Save your staff time playing phone tag.
If a patient has a problem, it goes something like this: they call into the office, and leave a message, either with someone on your staff or a recorded message. Then they wait for your staff to make their way down the messages to theirs (how many times has your staff come in the morning to find dozens of messages waiting?) and to pass the message for you to consult on their issue, decide what to do, and then someone to call them back. Altogether, it’s a lot of people, time, and rigamarole. Nothing about it is effective, and it can leave your staff feeling stressed out and always behind.
With a remote monitoring system, your patients can simply send a message (with the option of including a photo) through the app, and you can look at it and get back with them quickly. Even if you assign a staff person to monitor the app, the total time goes from hours to minutes. Dental and orthodontic staff who use the In Hand Dental app have reported that they can get through 30 messages in less than 20 minutes! Imagine how productive, organized, and calm that would make your staff feel!
- Less cleaning and a less crowded schedule.
Our doctors find that upwards of 90% of patient calls can now be resolved not only without an office visit, but within 15 minutes via the app. That’s a huge time savings!
Less office visits (especially unnecessary ones) lead to less crowded schedules, and less chance that you run behind. It leads to actual breathing room in the schedule, which makes every single one of your staff members feeling more relaxed. Plus, it saves and creates time for real emergencies that need to be seen in-office immediately.
- Happier patients.
Most patients don’t want to come into the office to solve a minor issue if it can be resolved over the phone (or in this case, over a remote monitoring system). When you work with patients and can use remote monitoring to help resolve issues, you have happier patients with better outcomes.
This is an outcome that definitely makes everyone in the practice happier.
In the video, Dr. Hoffman’s assistant, Becky, discusses how the app works for their practice and is an efficient tool that relieves an overburdened staff.
“It doesn’t create any extra work for anyone in the practice. It is a different type of work. I’m still working, but I’m not working more than I was before. Actually this is a lot less stressful for me than sitting chairside and looking at the clock going, “Okay, we’re behind. What do we do here?”
I am never behind on the app. I can wake up sometimes in the morning and I have 30 messages. Sometimes 5 of those messages are from the same person. Just because you have 30 messages doesn’t mean you have 30 people to deal with. Those 30 messages might be from 15 people.
I can respond to a patient – click, click, click – in 30 seconds. And if there's some kind of issue with the fit of their aligners, it might take me a minute or two.”
How much time can your staff save by using a dental monitoring system? Want to learn more about In Hand Dental? Go to our Contact Page and set up a time to book a free demo today!