According to the Dental Complaints Service (DCS), private dental treatment complaints rose by 17 per cent in the year May 2011 to April 2012. Though this figure is of course awful, it doesn’t come as much of a surprise.
This is because times have changed in dentistry, and we now work in a profession that is no longer solely occupied with the treatment of pain. In the case of private dentistry in particular, patients are far less patients these days, than they are consumers. They have rights as consumers and they are often keen to express their rights. When the cost of treatment starts to soar, so to do patient expectations, to the point where if a treatment costs thousands of pounds, a patient will expect the world. For the young or inexperienced dentist, this whole area is a minefield, and even the more experienced dentist can easily be caught out.
Tied in closely with this notion of patient expectations is the way we market ourselves to the world. As we have seen, the range of treatments now available to the modern dentist is far beyond anything that could have been imagined half a century ago, and our society has also changed dramatically in that time.
There are just so many dentists out there now, all competing for patients and offering different things, that marketing has become an increasingly important element to any dental practice’s activities. In the last few years especially we’ve seen a massive rise in the number of spa practices filling the high streets, offering ‘smile makeovers’ or ‘life changing’ treatments, but I fear very often the core messages we need to be delivering to patients get lost in translation.
From my (perhaps old-fashioned) perspective, dentistry should always be about delivering exceptional quality of care. This isn’t necessarily just about delivering the most dazzling smile, but is about how well you deal with the patient in your chair, and how you make their journey with you as comfortable as possible. After all, most people don’t like visiting the dentist, and so a visit is nearly always a stressful occasion.
Sometimes in the rush for beauty, as a profession we forget about the ‘essentials’ such as good old-fashioned empathy, and sometimes we forget that our patients just don’t understand dentistry like we do. As such we need to be completely open and honest with them through every step of the way. We need to be careful and considered in our approach, and we should make sure patients don’t get too caught up in the marketing.
There can be no doubting that modern dentistry is a fine balancing act. On the one hand we all need to attract patients and pay the bills, but we need to be responsible with how we sell our treatments to patients, and we also need to have the courage to be able to take a step back when work falls outside our comfort zone, and refer to a colleague if so needed.
Though marketing is unquestionably an essential part of modern dentistry, we should never lose sight of the ‘essentials’. With a little warmth, honesty, openness and compassion we can all avoid becoming another DCS statistic.