The 5 P’s of the Dental Patient Experience

Transcript performed by A.I. Please excuse the typos.
00:00
Welcome to Dental All-Stars. I’m Alex Nottingham, founder and CEO of All-Star Dental Academy. And our topic is the five P’s to the dental patient experience. So the patient experience is actually a course, one of our many courses that we have included in our online training system. So you can learn more about that at alls or take a look at our free webinar, alls backslash webinar where we talk more about phone skills, scheduling and so on. Check that out.

00:30
And with me is Larry Gazzardo, the head instructor of All Star Dental Academy. Please welcome Larry Gazzardo. How are you? So what pee are we gonna start with? Okay, before we get to the peas, gotta eat your, what is your peas in broccoli? And I don’t know, what is the expression? Peas and cues, which I don’t know what that means. There you go. I don’t even know what that means, but it sounds good. Other than being polite. Okay, watch your peas and cues, or eat your peas and rice. All right, whatever.

00:59
So before we get into the five P’s, so this is a acronym we use in our online training program. So we have our Quick Start onboarding program, we have our phone and scheduling program, we have our customer service program, and then we get into the patient experience and case acceptance. So I wanna talk about the patient experience. Now, there are two topics I wanna cover. I’ll start with one. One is the winning edge principle.

01:27
and another is flawless performance, that’s you. So let me just start with the winning edge principle and actually even before that, defining the patient experience is a very large topic. It encompasses phone skills, it encompasses case acceptance and we’re not gonna cover all of them because we have different courses and we talk about it but can we, from a big perspective, see how it all relates together? And so with the winning edge principle,

01:56
This is that small differences create enormous differences in results. So small differences in abilities create enormous differences in results. So someone who wins a gold medal versus a silver medal is very little. But the one who won it is on Wheaties, Box, millions of dollars of endorsements. You don’t know the silver medalist. You know the gold medalist. So the same thing with the practice. The margins, no pen intending, are small. And

02:25
If you can just be a little bit better, then that starts to have a big improvement of your practice in multiple areas. Same thing with the patient experience. So I want to keep that in mind. There’s a topic in the program that you talk about called flawless performance. So in a nutshell, what is Larry Guzzardo, the flawless performance, what does that mean? Well, when patients are talking about flawless performance, what they mean, what they’re looking for,

02:54
is for employees who know how to do their job. And they’re looking for employees who know a little bit about how everybody else does their job. And this includes the dentist as well. And that’s why continuing education is so important, you know, that they keep up their skills. But more importantly, if I work with your winning edge formula here, is there’s small nuances to the way that things are done. You know? I could say, hello.

03:24
Or I could say, hello. Right. I said the same thing, but if, and I did this for effect, but if you saw the small nuance between the difference in the way that I said hello, you received a different message from me. And so people use our tone of voice, they use our tone of voice to interpret exactly what we say. So my point here is that patients are looking for flawless performance.

03:51
That means employees know not only how to do their job, but they know a little bit about how everybody else does their job in the office. Includes the doctor and includes the specialists that you refer to or those that you work with. Because the team expects that you know who those people are and you know what my experience is gonna be like when I go to that office. And so we’ve got to know a little bit about these things. I say this because

04:20
In all surveys that I’ve ever taken, Alex, patients have always said, we always expect people to be able to answer our questions. And we expect the team to be knowledgeable. And I know why they say these things. They say it because they want that seamless, excuse me, they want that flawless performance. The same, seamless and flawless. Well, they- And I think- I was gonna say, if they walk into the store and you have an orange apron on, they don’t wanna hear, I don’t work this aisle.

04:49
Yeah, and that’s the expectation of a great practice or great business. They expect flawless performance. They expect you, using the gymnast analogy or gold medal analogy, is they expect you to stick the landing. And you come in, but it is frustrating when you’re dealing with businesses. And it’s also when you follow their process.

05:17
Usually you’re fine, but once you start going away from their process, this doesn’t know this, this doesn’t do that, not my problem, I don’t know, and that is not fall as performance. That is poor customer service. And what we’re looking to be is not a utility company. We’re looking to be a, or phone carrier, we’re looking to be more like the great hotels and service organizations. Not that we have to expend a ton of money,

05:47
just that we care and that we think about where the patient’s coming from and where we come from, we have experiences. We want it to be flawless, seamless. We want it to be without, and you talk about this as well, without barriers or agitation or unnecessary nonsense and to be able to get what you need in treatment. So I just want to paint that as the background to what we’re talking about, the big picture of the patient experience.

06:16
Now the five P’s of the patient experience that we’ll talk about here, just kind of outline. And let me just, and then I’ll also give you some subcategories that we’re not gonna cover. We did other podcasts on it, and we also talk about more deeply in the program. And so, I’ll throw out the other issues. The other issues are huddles, first impressions, image is important, we talk about that in the program, and we have done podcasts on that at webinars, responding to emails, voicemails, there’s so much to the patient experience. But we’re gonna…

06:45
our discussion on the five P’s of the patient experience. So those are the phone call, preparation, okay, you’ve got to be prepared to be able to start this patient experience, the patient exam, presentation, case presentation, and then proactive follow-up. Those are the five P’s. So let’s start in order. So phone call. Before we can say anything about a phone call, we have to, or even, okay,

07:15
talk about our acronym, which we’re known for. But the phone call is part of the patient experience. And if we don’t get this right, we’re not going any further, do not pass go. And so that’s why we spend so much time on phone skills and then scheduling to be able to get them in properly blocked. So I would say phone call, but as we go from phone call to preparation.

07:41
that’s where the scheduling has to be done properly, that they have a good experience, that they keep their appointment. So scheduling will help carry the phone call into preparation, or you can maybe say preparation includes some of the scheduling tools. So we have an acronym called the Great Call Process. So Larry, what is our Great Call Process and why is that important? Well, the Great Call Process is designed

08:09
to help a patient understand that they made the right decision to call your office. That’s right. The great call, this is the answer that you’re looking for. That is. The great call process is what prepares the patient and sets the tone for what it’s going to be like to come to your office. We just have to live up to that expectation. But if you’re dealing with expectation and Heather’s expectation who created the acronym being G greeting.

08:38
our rapport, which is the powerhouse of the recall process and the patient experience. 20% there, 40% there. Yeah, and then we get into engaging the patient, asking for the appointment and taking information. And we have a multitude of factors of each of those that we wanna check off. And so back to flawless performance, you better know what the…

09:03
And using I’m in gym mode right now, right? So like a gym, this has to prepare their routine. And they’re preparing it, they have a certain sequence they follow, to be able to bring them into that again, that flawless performance. So so critical to be able to do that and that your team is trained to not just so let me ask you this. For practices, you’re still a top consultant as well, besides international speaker. But

09:33
you see like what you shouldn’t do. And it’s like, you know, doctor’s office, right? I mean, there’s no structure at all. And we’re really starting on a bad side of our patient experience so we can’t get the phone right. Yeah, yeah. Well, because when you don’t do it correctly, and the bottom line here is, you don’t create curiosity from the patient.

10:00
And when you don’t have curiosity from the patient, you don’t get commitment. And so when I listen to dentists and front office staff and what are their complaints about patients and attracting people is they don’t have people who are committed. And the reason why they’re not committed is because they don’t ever become curious because all we do is go, oh, you want an appointment? How about come in this afternoon? What about tomorrow morning? I’ll send an Uber out to come pick you up. They wanna do it right away.

10:29
or somebody says, I’d like an appointment, and we say, that’s great. What kind of insurance do you have? Right. And it becomes a commodity, again, we can spend a lot of time, is it becomes a commodity, you either don’t care, they ask you a price, you answer it without getting to know them. The whole point, I will say this and move on to our patient experience, but that the goal with the phone call is to build a relationship. Yes. And to transcend this,

10:59
commodity situation, we’re not Walmart. And we talk a lot about this, Larry, is that we’re service-based, not a product that you’re commodity, but you can be that if you let the patient commoditize you, and that’s not good for both of your situations. Dentists are healers, they’re professionals, and we wanna create a great experience. So part of that is get to know the patient, care, so we better care, and get that in the mindset. So the whole great call process and the training on phone skills is there to get there. Okay.

11:28
So we did a great phone call. We’re trained. That’s a whole nother can of worms, right? Having the program, but then being able to get your team to do it. We’re doing it, we’re training. Now, and let’s even say, and again, this is we’ll do another podcast on scheduling, the essentials of scheduling, but now let’s say we schedule properly, we blocked properly, they’re showing up, all that verbiage. Now we have to prepare with them. What are we preparing for before the patient exam?

11:58
happening before all that. Like where do we have to be as a, as a team? This is a team case acceptance. Well, what needs to happen, Larry, we have to know that this patient is coming and we have to know a little bit about who this patient is. If we bump into them, into the hallway or if we get introduced to them, people sniff out very, very quickly. You don’t know who I am. You know what I mean? And you don’t know anything about me. And any true. And so

12:25
even if all we know is you’re our new patient. So if I get introduced and say, hey Susie, I want you to meet Mr. Larry here. Oh, Mr. Larry, you’re our new patient. That’s gonna affect the experience. It’s subtle. And it’s so little. It’s so little. But if the reaction is, so who are you? You know what I mean? From the employee, what kind of experience is that patient going to have?

12:52
Totally true. It makes you know better than the worst dentist in town. That’s right, and that’s why, and we’re not gonna talk about it, we have other podcasts in our program, we talk about it, but the, as I mentioned earlier, the huddle and the other tactics that we can do to make sure we’re prepared, to make sure that we know. And you’re right, it’s so simple that even we know this is high new patient, Larry, I mean, you acknowledge them, and that’s your 80% there.

13:21
Right, well we want to know who, we’ve got a new patient coming in, who are they? You know a little bit about them. We also want to know what time are they coming in? Right. Because we want to be able to anticipate their arrival. People, when they come play someplace new, they don’t expect to have to introduce themselves. It’s very awkward for them saying, hi, I’m new. You know what I mean? They expect us to be standing there going, hey, you look like our new patient today. I’m here to help you. That calms them down, that relaxes them.

13:50
that reassures them like, oh, I knew I chose the right place. I’m so glad I decided, you know, I could tell from the phone call that you were gonna be helpful. And I love what you say where they’re kinda testing out where are they gonna fail and disappoint me in this process. And I think, so again, we start with the phone that’s passed on. And then when they come, the preparation, part of the preparation is the introduction. People know, often we recommend a tour.

14:19
that people get to see what’s going on. That could be a tactic that’s being used, that you’re welcome to office manager or the treatment coordinator or the hygiene. Some things being done to really welcome them as family, because we don’t just want them to come and be happy that day. We want them to stay for a while and refer. That’s our goal. So with that, so that’s happening, the tour, also the preclinical interview, I would probably put in this stage of.

14:47
preparation before the exam. So that can happen as well. Yeah. Anything else that are some ideas that you would that come to mind? Well, part of what we talk about, you know, initial impressions are really really important. People aren’t supposed to judge us on a snap. Except they do. And we know that they do. So that’s why we want to carefully choreograph even that first appointment that we know when you’re arriving, we know your name.

15:17
We’re able to start to develop rapport with you very quickly by repeating, we know who you are. We know why you came here today. You know what I mean? Um, we know how you found out about us. We can relay that to them, but you know, in our courses, we talk about how we like the treatment coordinator to actually do the tour, make the introductions. Hey, there you go. Phyllis who also works here. You know what I mean? She’s familiar with your information. If you ever have questions,

15:45
You could talk to either one of us, but she can help you too. But we also like that treatment coordinator to explain their role. You know, these are one of the things that’s obvious to us, but it’s not obvious to the patient, you know? And so we like the treatment coordinator to explain, you know, I’m responsible for the doctor’s schedule. If you decide to have any treatment done here in the office, Ms. Jones, we don’t want you to worry because we will, I will always go over the schedule with you. I will go over fees.

16:15
I will talk to you about your insurance reimbursement. We have some patients who like to pay for their treatment over time. I can talk to you about those details. The point is there’s a whole, and this is what’s fun. As you’re saying, I say five P’s and it’s very simple, but they start the conversation that you said from these five P’s, number one, when you get to the part about preparation, it’s knowing you’re coming. And then from there, we can continue deepening the training of what else are you doing?

16:42
Yes. And and so I won’t even get to implementation. So when you’re listening, I try to simplify things because it’s important because we get overwhelmed. And then you build like weights up from there to be able to get your team. I mean, what Larry’s getting into, that takes time and you’ll get there. But we have to build up to it and sustain it once you’re there. So sustaining. All right. So phone call preparation. Then we have the patient exam, the patient exam. Tell me kind of in a nutshell.

17:11
Because again, this is a, we like these short, concise, to the point podcasts. Right, right. So in a nutshell, what’s happening in the patient exam? Yep, so the treatment coordinator reviews what they’re going to do, then the doctor comes in, okay, because we like this to happen either in a treatment room or in a private place in the office or whatever. But the important thing is, is the treatment coordinator is able to hand off the patient to the doctor.

17:40
And so the patient coordinator is able to say, you know, this is Mr. Larry, he’s our new patient today. He found out about us from whatever, and he called because he was having a problem with this tooth. Now the doctor can say, hey, well, you know what, Mr. Larry, it’s great to see you, and I’m glad to learn that you just moved into town and all that. There’s some questions I’d like to ask you about this tooth. So it directs the conversation. It makes the patient feel more

18:10
comfortable, makes them feel more comfortable because they know they were listened to by the treatment coordinator. The doctor doesn’t have to repeat and say the same questions all over again. Well, who are you? How’d you find out about us? You know, that kind of stuff. Patients hate those things. You know what I mean? But now the doctor can start on the patient exam. In a nutshell, the patient exam is a time to determine what problems are going on in the patient’s mouth. Got it. And we’re also trying to find out.

18:39
Does the patient care about what’s going on in their mouth? How concerned are they with what’s happening to them? Basically. And then that starts to take us into a whole level of training as to setting up that exam. Yes. And we have different methods in the program. We also, many of you have heard our president of coaching talk about 95.5 case acceptance program. So we have different methods to be able to do that. So again, as you can see, we have this overarching model and then we start to build and deepen into that. Okay, so.

19:07
We talk about that, patient exam, then the presentations. I was speaking about the 95-5 case presentation. So in a nutshell, so we got the information. Now we go to presentation. And what is happening here? What’s the outcome? Obviously, say the outcome is we want them to accept treatment, right? So tell me a little bit about the patient exam section. Well, the patient, the case presentation section. Case presentation. In a nutshell, the case presentation is nothing more than a summary.

19:36
of what you’ve already talked about and decided at the exam. You see, we see dentists all the time who are wrought with fear and anxiety because they don’t know what they should put on the treatment plan or if they’re going to blow them out of the water, you know what I mean, with too high of a fee, which tells me they’re not using the examination to find out if the patient cares about what’s happening to them. Because when they do, there are questions. We talk about these in our courses.

20:06
There are questions that you could ask the patient, which will tell you how to write the treatment plan. And it’ll also tell you not to be afraid of the fee because we’ve already gotten approval from the patient that they’re comfortable with the range that it’s gonna fall into. And again, this is highly simplified because we’re talking about the five P’s, big picture of the patient experience. And then what, and there it’s a whole, there’s other training, there’s methods, and then…

20:35
practicing and role playing to get that done and choreographing, because again, going back to this, for us to stick the landing, we have to have the big picture, and we have to be training, everybody’s gotta be in sync. And we have to look for spots in the patient experience that are weak spots, because if we stumble here, it’s hard to make up the points with the judge, right? So think about a gymnast, and they’re graded based on the performance. You stumble early, it’s gonna be hard to make that back up.

21:04
And how big was this thumble? That’s a point deduction. Right, you don’t want to get a deduction because you didn’t greet them or you didn’t introduce them or you didn’t hand them off. That’s right. And they’re looking, there’s small deductions, technical deductions. And so you have to be least avoid the big ones and start working towards the end. It’s an ongoing process. So I’m saying it’s not one and done. Our philosophy is consistency over intensity. We’re training, we’re building up and we’re sticking with it, everybody. All right, so that happens.

21:34
then they accept or they don’t or something else has to happen. And that’s where we have proactive follow-up. Yes. And with proactive follow-up, we want to make sure. I was just talking in other podcasts about this, that this is an area where we fail in many businesses, is following up. Even when they accept treatment, doesn’t mean you’re done. You still got to collect. There might be broken in payments. We have to get them on the schedule. So that’s where we have to have intention. And

22:03
Even with those that are re-cares or that are follow-up on case presentation, we will love our practice management tools and systems that do automation. We wanna make sure we don’t rely only on automation. It helps, but we also want to have the personal touch. And when there’s outstanding treatment, we wanna make sure that we’re out there doing it. So again, it’s a whole nother area of the patient experience is not to forget follow-up.

22:33
because you did all this work. Yes. And you sold the case and they liked the case and you didn’t finish it. Right, but our process also makes follow-up easier. It does, it does. It develops a different relationship with the treatment coordinator and the patient. Absolutely. And so, and the difference is that the patient sees the treatment coordinator as an advisor and not an adversary. Correct, not a salesperson. Which means they take your phone call.

23:02
You know, that’s right. They coordinate when we’re gonna make decisions and how we’re gonna get things done. That’s what makes the follow-up work. Because we know you can call people all day long. Doesn’t mean they’re gonna call you back. But when you develop the relationship correctly through this whole 5P process, then now you’re gonna get more yeses, more stuff on the books. If you don’t have the time to do it right, when will you have the time to do it over? Don’t I? So it’s important.

23:31
If we do this flawless performance, winning edge, the five P’s of the patient experience correctly, then we’re gonna save a lot of time and frustration. Dr. Justin Marchegiani Yeah. Dr. Justin Marchegiani And have a– a well-oiled machine that we’d love to do. And we love the patients. They become better patients. We take care of them. We become their friends. Uh– they refer and so on. That’s the beauty of training. So yes, I– I–

23:56
That’s it. That’s the five P’s of the patient experience. Because the experience creates compliant patients. And when you have compliant patients, everything is easier. So to learn more about the patient experience and how to apply the patient experience into your practice, you can go to alls learn more about our online training, our coaching, and so on, and our events. And then we also have a webinar, alls backslash webinar.

24:24
where we talk about the patient experience, how it affects your practice, and some of the skillsets involved. Totally free webinar. I encourage you, take advantage of that. Larry Gazzardo, thank you so much for being on the program and joining us. That is a five P’s of the patient experience. Remember to follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, share with your friends, and get the episodes as they are released. And until next time, go out there and be an All-Star.