Patient care is of utmost importance in dental practices across Australia. The healthcare system in Australia is committed towards giving the best medical care including dental care for patients. It is an initiative to bring Australia’s high-quality healthcare system to the world’s top.

Here are a few best practices and strategies used in dentistry in Australia.

Dental practice management best practices

Everyone wants great teeth, but not all may work towards it. Proper dental care is essential to maintain good oral health. Dentists work towards giving the best care for patients with patients’ experience at heart. Best dental practices work towards meeting and exceeding patient expectations.

Here are the best practices dentists and dental practices in Australia must follow:

Patient communication

Communication is key to all types of businesses. It’s equally vital in the healthcare industry. Patients are of utmost importance in healthcare industry including dentistry, which applies from clinicians to other medical and administrative staff. Dentists conducting dental appointments must also communicate properly with patients to diagnose accurately and recommend the correct treatment. In this modern era, there are several ways in which dentists and dental administrative staff can communicate with patients.

Face-to-face

Face-to-face communication is the most effective method to use and shows the best results. Dental practices should train all their staff to communicate effectively and maintain good relationships with patients. From the receptionist to the dentist, everyone should be able to provide the best services to clients.

Over the phone

Phone etiquettes are also helpful in any profession. It is the same in dentistry where from the receptionist to the dentist should be able to carry out their services to the best level, via phone. From taking appointments to conducting consultations, everything should be done in a proper manner over the phone. The patient should not feel isolated or that he didn’t get proper services due to the communication medium.

Via email

Emails are also a common form of communication in this era. Dental practices may have to communicate with their patients to keep up with things like appointments, via email. Emails should be proofread and checked for grammatical errors before sending. Email etiquettes should also be followed to make his form of communication successful. The way the staff communicates via emails could say a lot about the dental practice itself.

On social media

The use of social media is also on the rise in today’s technically-advanced era. Social media is primarily used as a way of engaging with leads and attracting attention. Social media and marketing professional working for a dentist or dental practice, should ensure that queries forwarded towards the practice are responded to professionally.

Improve the working environment

Improving the working environment is essential from the part of the patient and the staff. Both patients and staff want to work in a clean, inviting, and friendly environment. Not only the observation and consultation rooms but also the waiting rooms should be elegantly designed to be warming and welcoming to the patient. Here are some tips on how to keep the waiting rooms in best condition:

Use neutral colors, like blue, on walls. It helps patients feel much calmer and more relaxed.

A little bit of natural light streaming into the room does wonders.

Keep up-to-date magazines to keep patients busy and not feel the time passing by.

Keep leaflets informing readers about the various services provided by the dental practice.

Comfortable seats.

A water dispenser to keep patients hydrated.

Flexible financial options

Consulting dentists in Australia is very expensive. Therefore, dental practices should aim at providing easy payment schemes and other facilities to help patients bear up the costs. Here are some of the things that dental practices could implement to help ease the financial burden of the patient:

Payment plans

Treatment plans

Acceptance of cash, check, or credit cards

Special financing plans

Insurance coverage

Referral schemes and discounts

Several medical recruitment companies, including Medfuture, have introduced referral schemed to help ease this burden.

Implementing technology in dentistry practice management

Technology is everywhere and proves to be beneficial in many industries. The dental sector has also seen a vast improvement with the introduction of technology. Different software help simplify procedures from making appointments to tracking them and many more functionalities.

Dental practice software system

Software is essential in running a streamlined dental practice. A good dental software system will do the following:

Track appointments

Manage patient records

Send automated reminders on appointments to patients

Collect data

Generate patient reports

Connect with phone systems

Cloud-based phone systems streamline the patient experience for dental practices in the following ways:

Running telehealth video sessions

Dentists answering patient calls on their phones without divulging their personal numbers

Flipping calls from a phone to a computer without interrupting the conversation

Holding, recording, and transferring calls

Best dental practice software systems

Several different dental practice software systems exist, out of which a dental practice can choose a suitable one.

Dentrix Ascend

Dentrix was the first dental practice management software for Microsoft Windows. Today, it has advanced up to becoming a cloud-based software providing solutions for administration, practice management, charting and imaging, and group practices. It provides a free demo and hands-on training with the package. The software provides support via phone or email.

Curve Dental

Curve Dental is also a cloud-based software that dental practices from anywhere in the world can access. It allows for excellent remote working options when one is not available in office. This software manages billing, scheduling, imaging, and charting in a simple way. Its price varies depending on the number of dentists in the practice.

Denticon

Denticon is an all-in-one practice management system that provides real-time reporting facilities, and access to practice information from anywhere at any time. It was the first cloud-based software to be introduced in the dental industry. The software’s excellent features include having modules for records management, patient communication, treatment planning, imaging/ charting, claim management, and more.

Challenges in dental practice management

Here are some of the challenges in dental practice management in Australia.

Balancing appointments – The bigger the dental practice is the more challenging it is to manage. Scheduling is vital to manage appointments.

Competing with other dental practices – Competing with other practices requires having a good marketing strategy that includes using social medial platforms, emails campaigns, and user-friendly websites to attract new patients.

Patient confidentiality

Maintaining patient confidentiality is of utmost importance when running a dental practice. Dentists should ensure not to share any confidential details of the patient outside of the practice for any other purpose. A dental practice that breaches in patient data will lose its credibility and will also have to pay a hefty fine.

Taking dentistry in Australia to the next level

Managing a dental practice and working as a dentist is not as simple as it sounds. It involves a combination of many other processes that should work together to make it a complete solution. The above procedures and best practices help ensure that dentistry in Australia is taken to another level.

Medfuture is one of the leading medical recruitment companies at a global level. We aim a providing the best medical and dental specialists to medical and dental practices across Australia. Visit the Medfuture website to view the latest dentistry jobs in Australia.