August 2008 | DPR
DPR Survey Exclusive | Patient Education
Informed and Involved
Many patients today are well informed on their own, but today’s patient education capabilities allow GPs to get them even more informed, as well as actively involved in their oral health.
By Stan Goff
For survey results, click here.
General practitioner Dr. Bill Busch, of the Kansas City Dental Group (drbusch.com), knows the power of an educated patient.
| Guru | Henry Schein | 
| The Guru computer-based interactive patient education library provides explanations, notations, and images customized for each patient. It was developed to help patients make informed decisions about proposed treatment, and the system features detailed animations covering a wide array of topics. | Photo courtesy of Dentrix Dental Systems, A Henry Schein Co. |
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If you ask him how much today’s high-quality interactive patient education systems can improve patients’ case acceptance, he’ll rattle off that maybe eight in 10 patients will say yes after taking in this type of information and education. Even more impressive, he feels, is that some of these patients who initially decline care will come back several months—or even years—later and ask for the specific treatment they had learned about initially from a memorable patient education presentation.
Dr. Busch lectures on behalf of Henry Schein Guru patient education software (Dentrix Dental Systems, dentrix.com and howdoyouguru.com) and also participated in the production of the CAESY 2008 DVD (Patterson Dental, caesy.com). He raves about both of these systems. However, he also acknowledges that there are several impressive offerings available today from a number of manufacturers, including Consult-PRO (consult-pro.com) and InfoStar (infostarproductions.com), just to name a couple of other patient education products available today to dentists. Each of these companies provide high-quality presentations that feature capabilities to reach patients chairside, in the reception room, and also on a take-home or at-home via-the-Internet basis.
DPR’s Exclusive Patient Education Survey lets you find out just what your colleagues are using to assist in educating their patients. Many patients today will surf the Internet for healthcare information, and some of today’s patient education systems feature Web capabilities. But it’s critical to provide consistent, concise, and up-to-date interesting information to patients who are in your practice. The Internet just cannot—and should not—replace the dentist or his staff as the primary source of information for patients.
| Chairside 2008 | Consult-PRO |  | Sinus Lift (above) Chairside 2008 features around 800 presentations and 3D animations. Customizable Users can create unlimited number of custom presentations. Root Canal Narrated 3D animations with accompanying slides and text make a concise educational tool. Implant The system includes presentations of specialist treatments and they are available in multiple languages including Spanish, French and Italian. | Photo courtesy of Consult-PRO. |
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Effective patient education is a critical part of every successful practice, and Dr. Busch has plenty of evidence to prove as much.
“For instance, if you have a patient with a cracked tooth who needs a root canal, and a post, and a crown, you can put those three presentations together and save them,” Dr. Busch explained. “So every time that patient comes in with that need, you just press a button, and it will play all three of the appropriate presentations in a row. With this ability, I would say case acceptance goes up almost 80%. Of course, you still get that 20% who just may not have the time nor the money to do treatment when you show a presentation; with them it may not be a situation of not understanding the problem.”
That’s not to say they won’t seek the treatment down the road.
“The nice part, too, is that people will come back a year or two after the time that you used your patient education software and will bring that same presentation back with them. They actually ask for the treatment over the phone.
“If you just say you need a crown, and then they walk away and they come in for their checkup, and then a year or two later, they’re saying, ‘I remember that video that Dr. Busch showed me on the crown. I want to do that now.’ This is happening rather than us just telling the patients, ‘Hey you need a crown,’ without any documentation or presentation with it.”
Jana Lee Berghoff, RDH, Corporate Technology Marketing Manager for Patterson Dental, says one of the best things about quality patient education presentations is that they allow practices to deliver a consistent, strong message to every patient. Even well-trained experienced staff members may not deliver the best message each and every time they explain somewhat complicated treatments to patients.
“The message has to be consistent, especially today with everything so litigious,” Berghoff said.
“To be able to know that the patient got consistent and concise education is important, as is delivering an explanation of the procedure that’s the same every single time.”
With CAESY’s server-based patient education software, for example, the doctor knows that every patient is receiving the same comprehensive education, regardless of who is attending to the patient.
“You won’t have to wonder exactly what they (the staff member) said. When you think about it, what you really want is that consistent message delivered. And with procedures and the technology always changing, you want to be able to educate them properly,” she said.
“Technology is changing in dentistry. We are introducing new technology to these patients, like digital x-ray and CEREC machines that are new to them. With CAESY always being updated, we can give patients the education they need on these new technologies.”
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