Hybrid Onboarding Process

Patient well-being is DR SMILE's top priority. The goal is to provide patients with the highest quality aligner treatments. For this reason, DR SMILE has established a continuous improvement process. Central components of this quality management are the criteria for the selection of partner practices, their onboarding and training, as well as the continuing education of dental professionals through the DR SMILE ACADEMY. DR SMILE partners are independent dental practices run by licensed dentists. They are independent in their professional decision-making. DR SMILE carefully selects its potential cooperation partners. This is because the competence of the partners is crucial to the success of the DR SMILE concept. The DR SMILE partner dentist receives extensive training before starting the treatments.

Recent years have shown that time is a scarce commodity. To make onboarding as efficient as possible for dental practices, DR SMILE has introduced "hybrid onboarding". The hybrid onboarding process is based on three pillars, which offer enormous flexibility. The training and education sessions can be conducted independently of time and are designed in such a way that after their successful completion, partner practices are able to treat patients with aligner therapies from day one. 

The three pillars that manifest the quality claim are: the DR SMILE ACADEMY, the DR SMILE Guideline and the Remote Onboarding. 

The Online Academy

In the first step, the future partner dentist completes the online courses of the DR SMILE ACADEMY, which is the central platform to specifically address the digitally supported treatment processes and efficiently train the practice team to become a new partner. The structure of the DR SMILE ACADEMY is such that, in addition to self-selectable e-learnings, there are two curricula which the future partner dentist must complete before receiving his first DR SMILE patient in the practice. 

In the first curriculum, important topics that are crucial for the start of the cooperation and the patient’s safety are covered. For example: How do you carry out an anamnesis, how do you examine findings? There is also training on how to create dental images, which are important for remote diagnostics. The basics of scanning and how to use the 3Shape scanner to capture digital dental impressions are also included in the training sessions. Finally, there are coachings, on how to conduct the consultation with the patient - one of the most important points at the first consultation, where the patient is informed about the steps of the aligner treatment.

The second curriculum deals intensively with the upcoming dental services; topic blocks such as engagers (attachments), IPR/ASR, but also rentention (fixed retainers or aligner retainers) and the preparation of medical devices are presented to prepare the partner practices for the services. The curricula and thus the familiarization process of the partner practices follow the same effective structure in all European countries where DR SMILE is present. 

The DR SMILE Guideline

During the onboarding process, the future partner is familiarized with the DR SMILE guideline, the second pillar of quality management. The guideline describes a clear standard of cooperation to ensure the quality of treatment. According to this guideline, partners are encouraged to personally examine patients, take X-rays, if necessary, review the medical history, and complete 3D scans of the maxilla and mandible and bite recordings (left and right). Then, the extraoral and intraoral images are sent to DR SMILE.

Remote Onboarding

After the prospective partner practice has successfully completed the DR SMILE ACADEMY, remote onboarding takes place. As part of the third pillar of the onboarding process, dental practices are personally trained by DR SMILE training experts. This takes place in a specially equipped training room at the Berlin headquarters. The dental practices are connected live to the training center. During this familiarization step, the 3D scanners are set up together and the entire practice team receives live scanner and anamnesis training, including photo training. The entire training takes half a day and is the preparation for the following "Opening Day". The "Opening Day" is the deadline when the first patients come to the new DR SMILE partner practice for their appointment.

A new partner practice receives patients for aligner therapies from day one. This is something special and an absolutely unique selling point of DR SMILE. This is because the dentist does not have to gradually build up his patient base for his new offering – as it is common with other providers and new services, such as implants. Patients come to the practice from day one via the DR SMILE appointment booking system. This is a major challenge for the practice team.

The "Opening Day" is supervised by the DR SMILE area management team, which also supports the practice in the subsequent period and, if necessary, provides further training on any questions relating to scanning, anamnesis or photographs.

Overall, the hybrid onboarding process is a coherent procedure that is implemented for new partners as well as for new practice employees. It ensures compliance with dental quality standards for DR SMILE aligner treatments. In turn, the e-learning system provides interesting insights and extensive data that form the basis of new studies, with the aim of continuously improving the quality of treatments for the benefit of patients.