3 DSO Conferences in 3 Weeks: Takeaways to Save You the Travel

Intellicon, Salt Lake City

Sponsored by: Dental Intel
Who attended: 74 dental group practices; many brought their office team
My role: Speaker & 1^st time attendee

My observations & takeaways:
I’ve known Dental Intel as an analytics platform targeting solo & small groups that seems to be well known for its helpful morning huddle guide. I learned that they have expanded to include patient engagement (Modento acquisition) and patient payments (Wisetack & CareCredit) and are focusing on integrating these products through a “Better Together” strategy. They also are planning an integration with Dentrix Ascend by year’s end, which will be their first move toward cloud-based PMS interoperability. And they’re incorporating AI so teams can ask questions about the data to better understand and take action steps.

In my session, attendees ranged from a 50-location group to a solo practice using Dental Intel – and the general agreement was that successful software adoption required a dedicated project manager who communicates the reason for the change, documents how the system will be used by the team, and checks utilization to follow up with team members who are not logging in. 

Data shared from across their customer base:

• Cancellations and no shows have increased 10% since Covid and risen to a 3-year high.
  
  
• Days sales outstanding traditionally 28 days, went up to 62 and now down to 45 days.
  
  
• Patient growth % actually decreased from 2022 to 2023, believed due to hygienist staffing gaps.
  
  
• The hygiene reappointment rate fell from 39% to 18%. This is a major problem.

RCM Bootcamp, Scottsdale

Sponsored by: Zentist
Who attended: Estimated 200 RCM leaders, primarily from DSOs
My role: Panel moderator & 1^st time attendee

My observations & takeaways:

• The future of dental revenue cycle management is moving toward automated insurance posting. This feature is in high demand among DSOs, and many companies are actively developing it to meet industry needs.
  
  
• Advancements in patient payment technology are transforming how dental practices structure their financial policies. Now that software solutions offer the option to save a credit card on file, practices are reconsidering their collections process and updating the office financial agreements.
  
  
• For successful implementation of new technologies, it’s crucial for both the revenue cycle team and operational leaders in dental practices to embrace and fully integrate these innovations. Collaboration between the operations side and tech adoption is key to driving efficiency (and I’m seeing a fantastic fit for Optimize Dental to support busy teams who want to increase automation but don’t have the time for yet another project).
  
  
• DSO Revenue Cycle Leaders: It seems that the primary responsibility of DSO revenue cycle leaders is managing central business units, but also dedicating a substantial amount of their time to implementing and optimizing technology solutions.

Despite the back-to-back schedule, I felt very honored to speak at all three of these conferences and appreciated learning from the stage as well as from other attendees. My personal goal was to introduce Optimize Dental services to dental groups as we fill the gap between buying new technologies and helping groups successfully adopt software across all locations with a heavy focus on change management. In talking with Dental Intel, Zentist, and Sunset Technologies, each agreed that dental groups invest in technology to achieve consistent data, standardize operations and ultimately drive EBITDA. However, challenges abound and having a product-agnostic software adoption service available to dental groups will help technology vendors truly drive measurable results for their clients.

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