While work and life have been intertwined for years, there is less distinction between them now than ever before. Because of the pandemic, working from home at least part of the week has become the norm. From writing emails while lounging on the living room sofa to folding laundry while in a meeting, the way we work has drastically changed over the past few years. Employees are now wondering how to best integrate work and life, and how work-life integration can help prevent burnout.

The rise and effect of remote work

Because of the rise in remote work, the line between employees’ personal lives and work lives has become blurred. Employees and their managers are starting to value work-life integration over work-life balance due to this blurred line.

A healthy balance between work and life is paramount as employees struggle with the shifting landscape of the workforce, mental health challenges worsened by the pandemic and overall burnout. According to Zippia, 89% of workers have experienced burnout within the last year. Work-life integration offers a potential solution to employee burnout, which can help improve a worker’s mental state as well.

What is work-life integration?

The Society for Human Resource Management defines work-life integration as “a holistic approach that seeks to blend personal and professional needs.” Instead of focusing on finding the perfect balance between personal and work life, work-life integration seeks to blend the two.

Employees’ lives and workloads are constantly changing, which is why work-life integration strives to be flexible. Workday schedules and personal schedules are integrated depending on each day, so no one day looks the same as the previous.

Work-life integration vs. work-life balance:

While the overall goal of both work-life integration and work-life balance is to find balance between the workday and the personal life of an employee, the approach to each concept is different.

Work-life balance treats work and personal life as two distinct things. Employees strive to accomplish as much as they can within working hours to be able to enjoy their personal life before and after the workday. Because of the continued shifting landscape of the workforce and the increase in work-from-home policies, work-life balance might not be the best approach for finding balance.

Work-life balance can seem unrealistic as employees increasingly have to handle personal issues during the workday: answering a phone call from their family member, taking the dog for a quick walk around the block or heading out a little early for a dentist appointment.

Work-life integration expands on the concepts created by work-life balance. While work-life balance separates work from life, work-life integration combines the two. Employees strive to find harmony between their lives and their work responsibilities.

Employees decide when to use their time for work tasks versus personal tasks. Gartner research found that 43% of workers said that having flexible working hours increased their productivity. While work-life balance fades out, work-life integration seems to be the direction the workforce is moving toward.

How to implement work-life integration as a manager:

• Gain insight from employees – Conduct surveys to determine what current work-life integration strategies are working and which could be developed.
• Allow employees to pick their most productive hours – Determining when employees feel the most productive can allow managers to understand which days should be work-in-office days and which days they should allow employees to work from home.
• Create and implement a plan – Implementing a plan ensures that work-life integration is a priority. A work-life integration strategy could include simple things such as providing childcare services and a walking club during lunch breaks, or something more complex such as continued learning opportunities and a four-day workweek.

How to implement work-life integration as an employee:

• Create and implement a plan – Learning to be flexible can be difficult for employees who have been used to strict work schedules for years. Allow time for this change to become rooted into daily life. Creating a personal plan can be helpful; create a checklist of work to-dos and personal to-dos for the day and tackle each task when time allows.
• Find support from family and employer – Ensuring that family and managers are aware of the flexibility of work-life integration is important. Having support from both family members and co-workers can ensure that you don’t neglect one side of work-life integration while putting your entire focus into the other side. Allow them to hold you accountable.
• Don’t aim for perfection – Constantly working leads to burnout. Allow yourself moments to spend doing personal tasks without feeling guilty for taking a break from work. There is no perfect amount of time to spend on work, so allow yourself time to decompress before tackling the next obstacle.

Work-life integration is possible

While some people might prefer to completely separate work from personal life, developing a work-life integration mindset offers employees a relatively new way to structure their work and home life. As lines continue to be blurred between home and work, work-life integration becomes the future structure of the workplace.

Telemedicine allows healthcare professionals to connect with patients remotely. Advancements in electronic information and telecommunication technologies have fostered the rapid adoption of telemedicine in the past decade. According to Doctor.com’s report on healthcare trends in 2020, telemedicine adoption increased by 33% over the previous year, and telemedicine funding is expected to reach $185.6 billion by 2026.

COVID-19 has been a major catalyst for telemedicine adoption. In response to lockdowns and closures, clinicians adjusted their practices to offer treatment in a pandemic-safe manner, and many implemented telemedicine technology. This resulted in a sizable population of patients becoming familiar with telemedicine. In fact, Medical Economics found that 83% of patients expect to use telemedicine after the pandemic resolves.

However, for dental practices, telemedicine adoption continues to lag behind other medical fields. What is the cause of this?

In this article, we offer an overview of teledentistry, telemedicine for dentists. We discuss the primary benefits of teledentistry, and cover some of the pain points inhibiting its growth.

What is Teledentistry?

Teledentistry is the use of telecommunication technology to allow long-distance dental care, consultation, education, and public awareness. In general, there are two types of teledentistry.

Synchronous teledentistry refers to the real-time interaction between patient and dentist through the use of video conferencing tools (i.e., Evaluating patients through a videoconferencing tool, like Zoom).

Asynchronous teledentistry refers to the non-direct interaction between patient and dentist through the transfer of recorded health information (i.e., Sharing videos and radiographs through a HIPAA-compliant messaging service).

Teledentistry Benefits

Teledentistry offers various benefits for dental practices and patients. Some of the most important benefits are showcased below.

Increased safety

Teledentistry allows dentists to interact with patients in different physical locations. Teledentistry has proven itself to be a valuable tool for evaluating patients prior to in-person care and prescribing medication during post-operative evaluations.

Additional income

Teledentistry appointments are billable! Many insurance companies accept claim submissions for services rendered using telecommunication technology. Typically, CDT codes D9995 and D9996 are primarily used for these types of claims.

Obstacles of Teledentistry

Like we mentioned above, implementation of telemedicine has been slower in dentistry than other medical fields. Below, we cover the biggest obstacles for teledentistry adoption.

In-person care is often necessary

Some medical fields lend themselves better to telemedicine than others. For example, many mental health providers are able to effectively offer care through videoconferencing. Conversely, the most common dental procedures, ranging from teeth whitening to surgeries, rely on in-person care.

Additionally, the ability to implement teledentistry often depends on the type of treatment a dental practice provides. For example, orthodontic evaluations are much easier to do through videoconferencing than periodontal examinations.

Teledentistry implementation can be daunting

Using unfamiliar tech for video conferencing and sharing files can be overwhelming for many dental professionals. Additionally, many dentists are concerned with this teledentistry’s compliance with regulations. HIPAA-compliant telemedicine solutions, like Simplifeye, accelerate the implementation process, and make it easy to conduct remote dental appointments.

Bottom Line

COVID-19 accelerated the implementation of teledentistry in many dental practices nationwide. However, telemedicine adoption in dental practices has not kept up with other medical fields. The likely culprit is dentistry’s reliance on in-person care, which renders teledentistry useless for the common dental procedures.

However, teledentistry can be valuable for specific use cases. Teledentistry is an effective tool for evaluating patients remotely and prescribing medicine. Additionally, teledentistry adds an extra stream of revenue for dental practices. If you decide to implement teledentistry in your dental practice, there are several dental technology solutions, like NexHealth, that can accelerate implementation and management.

According to Kaiser Family Foundation, 37 million Americans do not have dental insurance. As a result, dental practices have begun offering their own personalized and affordable dental membership plans to patients. In total, less than 20% of dental practices currently have memberships. However, this figure is growing rapidly due to the adoption of dental membership plan software.

But how do these plans work? And are they a worthwhile investment for dental practices?

Dental practices should weigh the costs and benefits of membership plans and become familiar with the software tools that enable them.

Dental Membership Plan Overview

Dental membership plans are similar to other subscription-based services that you are familiar with, such as Netflix or Amazon Prime. Patients enroll in membership programs where they pay subscription fees on a monthly or yearly basis. In return, patients receive care at a discounted rate.

Typically, patients pay $20 to $30 per month for their membership plans. In return, they are eligible for two free cleanings per year, and receive 10-20% off additional services. By increasing loyalty and creating a new revenue line, membership plans can become lucrative for dental practices.

Dental Membership Plan Benefits

Dental membership plans offer a variety of benefits for dental practices and their patients. The most notable benefits are listed below.

Cuts out the insurance middleman

Both dentists and patients can agree that dealing with insurance companies is a hassle. Many dentists are frustrated with filing claims while insurance companies eat into their bottom line. For patients, dental insurance is expensive and restricts access to practices that are in-network. Dental membership plans remove insurance companies from the equation.

With the membership model, dentists dictate their own fee schedules, and receive payments directly from their patients. Dental practices end up making more money and are able to pass the savings along to their patients.

Attracts uninsured patients

Uninsured patients often don’t receive the care they need because they perceive dental care to be too expensive. Who could blame them? Insurance companies often have opaque pricing with high deductibles, premiums, and copays.

Dental membership programs have transparent pricing with discounted rates. Membership plans are far more attractive to uninsured patients and often lead to higher case acceptance rates.

Reduces time spent on claims

As we mentioned before, filing insurance claims steals precious time from you and your front-office staff. Maintaining high claim acceptance rates is difficult, and every dental professional is familiar with being on hold with insurance companies and dealing with rejected claims. Dental membership plans lift this burden from your practice, so you can focus on providing excellent care for your patients.

Dental Membership Plan Software

A barrier to offering dental membership plans is the notion that implementation is a time-consuming process. However, dental membership plan software allows dentists to quickly set up and efficiently maintain membership programs.

Dental membership plan solutions automate important processes and manage the membership programs on behalf of dental practices. This allows dentists and front-office staff to focus on more important tasks such as offering exceptional care for patients. The most important features found in dental membership plan software are listed below.

The most popular dental membership plan solutions are Kleer, Dental HQ, and illumitrac. In general, these solutions cost a few hundred dollars a month. The software is typically priced as a flat fee per location, or a few dollars per member per month.

Configurable dental membership plans

Solutions like Kleer allow practices to create custom care plans that fit their needs. Practices can set their own pricing and treatments to include in the plans. Practices can also offer discounts for groups and families.

Automatic payment collection

Dental membership plan solutions often include features that allow practices to automatically receive recurring payments from their patients. This reduces administrative workload and eliminates the need for front-office staff to chase down outstanding balances. This is likely the most important feature found in membership plan software from a financial perspective.

Analytics

Dental membership plan software typically also includes an analytics dashboard that tracks revenue and monitors your performance. Tracking key metrics helps increase memberships and promotes practice growth.

Bottom Line

Dental membership plans are gaining momentum in practices across the country. This movement is being catalyzed by dental membership plan software that makes it easier to implement and manage an in-house plan.

In general, starting a dental membership plan is a better idea for dental practices with a large uninsured population, or those looking for a new revenue stream. Practices with less than 250 patients are better off managing their in-house plans themselves. Larger practices with over 250 patients will likely benefit from using dental membership plan software, which costs a few hundred dollars per month.