Orthotown May 2023 - 32

EARNED PLACEMENT
" IF PEOPLE THINK VIRTUAL CARE
AND REMOTE MONITORING
AREN'T 'REAL ORTHODONTICS,'
THEY DON'T UNDERSTAND THE
POWER OF THE TECHNOLOGY. "
- DR. BILL DISCHINGER
" The ability to know what's going
on weekly, as opposed to every
two to three months, has been impressive, "
says Dischinger. " Active
monitoring helps patients receive
the best-quality orthodontic care
possible, because there's more
time to properly finish treatment. "
More oversight, with
fewer appointments
Perhaps not surprisingly, the freedom
that Dischinger was looking
for in his schedule also turns out
to appeal to busy patients and
parents who are no longer forced
to rearrange their schedules for
bimonthly in-person visits. This
convenience has made remote
monitoring a market differentiator
to potential patients.
" I've told orthodontists all over
the world: 'Sorry, but you're not that
cool. People don't want to come
in and see you; they just want you
to straighten their teeth,' " says
Dischinger. " When patients can get
straight teeth without spending a lot
of time in an orthodontist's office,
their experience is so much better. "
(Plus, the prospect of having more
free time gives potiential patients
more of a reason to seek treatment,
and to be thrilled by how their progress
is going once they begin.)
" If we could give a patient a pill
that allowed them to wake up the
next morning with straight teeth,
or if we could give them aligners
or put on braces only once and
tell them they didn't need to come
back until their teeth were completely
straight, people would pay
a huge amount of money for those
options, " Dischinger says. " With
DentalMonitoring, we're close to
the second option. "
While some doctors still consider
remote monitoring or virtual
treatment in the same tier as
direct-to-consumer care, Dischinger
says that's absolutely not the case;
in fact, he believes his practice now
offers a higher level of care than before.
Before remote monitoring, patients
might visit the practice every
two months-which is a long time
for something to go wrong. With
traditional orthodontics, the doctor
can only hope and guess where a
patient will be in their treatment the
next time they walk into the practice.
" Now that we're seeing them
every week, the improvements are
huge, " Dischinger says. " Even by
only taking hygiene into account,
we know exactly how the patient
is doing. If people think virtual care
MAY 2023 | 32 | ORTHOTOWN.COM
and remote monitoring aren't 'real
orthodontics,' they don't understand
the power of the technology. "
DentalMonitoring has proven to
be an excellent solution for teen
patients who want to be treated
with clear aligners but whose parents
don't trust them to be responsible
participants. Weekly check-ins
hold the teens accountable, and
in-app communication between
patients and team members is easy
and convenient. " We can use clear
aligners more often because we
know there won't be compliance issues, "
Dischinger says. A coordinator
can respond quickly and directly
to patients, or can assign questions
to a doctor if needed.
Practice growth doesn't
require more space
With two decades of experience,
Dischinger says, " I look back at how
many chairs we used to run and
how many days we used to work,
and I don't think I could do it again.
I used to go to conferences and all
the speakers would talk about how
big their office was, and how many
chairs, and how much staff. The
message was: To be successful,
you had to keep getting bigger and
bigger. That may have been the
case at the time, but in the state of
orthodontics now, that's outdated.
" Today, because of dynamic
scheduling, my practice has extra
space we aren't using. In the future,
new practices or practices building
a new space could do so with a
smaller footprint, " he says.
Using technology
to ease the team's burden
Over the past three years, many if
not all orthodontists have struggled
with staffing issues, and it looks as
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