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Dental Tribune United Kingdom Edition

15Business Management TribuneMarch 28-April 3, 2011United Kingdom Edition www.thedbg.co.uk For more information and a quote contact the DBG on 0845 00 66 112 Please Note: Errors and omissions excluded. Any prices quoted are subject to VAT. The DBG reserves the right to alter or withdraw any of their services at any time without prior notice. Are you waiting to find out when the Care Quality Commission* inspect your practice? Your compliance with Clinical Governance and Patient Outcomes will be questioned with the introduction of the Care Quality Commission*, HTM 01-05 and the increase in PCT practice inspections. Would you like to know how you would fare when your practice is inspected and have the opportunity to take corrective action? The DBG Clinical Governance Assessment is the all important experience of a practice audit visit rather than the reliance on a self audit which can lead to a false sense of compliance. The assessment is designed to give you reassurance that you have fulfilled your obligations and highlight any potential problems. We will provide help and advice on the latest guidance throughout the visit. • Your premises including access, facilities, security, fire precautions, third parties and business continuity plans. • Information governance including Freedom of Information Act, manual and computerised records, Data Protection and security. • Training, documentation and certificates. • Radiography including IRR99 and IR(ME)R2000 compliance. • Cross infection and decontamination including HTM 01-05 compliance and surgery audits. • Medical emergencies including resuscitation, drugs, equipments and protocols. • Training, documentation and certificates. • Waste disposal and documentation and storage. • Practice policies and written procedures. • Clinical audit and patient outcomes including quality measures. The assessment will take approximately four hours of your Practice Manager’s time depending on the number of surgeries and we will require access to all areas of your practice. A report will be despatched to you confirming the results of our assessment. If you have an inspection imminent then we suggest that you arrange your DBG assessment at least one month before the inspection to allow you time to carry out any recommendations if required. Following the assessment you may wish to have access to the DBG Clinical Governance Package with on-line compliance manuals. The areas the DBG assesses are: Clinical Governance including Patient Quality Measures - Is your practice compliant? Have you addressed all 28 CQC outcomes? ? *England only. 20YEARSYEARS 20 9361 DBG ClinicalGov The probe 338x244.qxd:Layout 1 1/7/10 13:39 Page 1 About the author Julia Dawson joined Denplan in 1990, running the Administration depart- ment. Now as Director of Customer Services, Julia has overall responsibil- ity for the Practice Support Advisors, Customer Advisors, Registration and Administration Services, Insurance and Helpline, Corporate Customer Services teams and the Out-of-Hours Helpline team. Working closely with the other divisions across the company Julia and her team are constantly look- ing for ways in which they can improve and diversify their service offering. exist. This involves a group of practices joining together to create an out-of-hours service for the patients of those practic- es. Getting together with your fellow dentists, settling on the ground rules for your par- ticular rota and sharing the responsibility for your patients’ emergency care, ultimately results in greater patient loyalty for every practice involved, not to mention the satisfaction of knowing that you are providing the best pos- sible round-the-clock care – without chaining yourself to the surgery! Go the extra mile Oneofthethingsthatoftencome up when discussing poor call- centre experiences is being left to listen to a ringing phone. Most people will hang up after four or five rings dur- ing the day, but if you don’t have an out of hours an- swer-phone message in place the patient can often feel abandoned with nowhere to turn. An appropriate message with concise instructions can really make the difference to patients – often at a time of ex- treme pain and stress. It may sound silly to undertake training on some- thing that occurs when you’re not working, but getting your out-of-hours communication right is really important for retaining the loyalty and re- tention of your patients and can often go a long way to at- tracting new ones and growing your business. Some payment plan specialists offer a range of training courses on topics such as Improving Commu- nication and Customer Care, not to mention how to get across the clearest and most helpful out of hours informa- tion on your website. Many of these courses also offer verifiable CPD and can be in- valuable in improving the pa- tient journey and ensuring the very best care. So, hopefully the informa- tion here has shown you that providing an effective out-of- hours service is incredibly important, notonly to ensure that your patients are looked- after in an emergency, but also to secure their loyalty and open up communication with other practices in your area. It’s a win-win situation! DT ‘Getting your out-of- hours communica- tion right is really important for re- taining the loyalty and retention of your patients and can often go a long way to attracting new ones and grow- ing your business’ Patients should always have access to top quality care whatever the time