Hi everyone. I'm Brian Zimerman with Becker's,
and thank you for tuning into the Becker's Healthcare podcast series.
Today I'm pleased to be joined by Jay Lewa, VP of Dental with Sun Bit,
and Kristen Libe, vice President of Field Operations with LightWave Dental.
Jay and Kristen, thanks so much for being here.
Thank you for having us.
Great. So, so let's begin with some, some introductions here just so our,
our listeners can get to know each of you, um, first before we,
we dive into earnest.
So can each of you share a bit about your current roles and organizations?
Kristen, let's begin with you.
Yes.
I've got 22 years in the dental field starting as a dental assistant going on to
hygiene in Alabama for about seven years. Treatment coordinator,
building practices all the way up to president and c o o of the company I was
with before. I recently joined LightWave, uh,
within the last year to help them focus on the field operations for our growing
company of 84 dental practices.
I'm currently overseeing about 46 of those practices,
and it's going really well. Um, I love, love the focus on,
uh, leadership in our organization at LightWave and how we are helping providers
continue to reach their goals and grow.
Excellent. Well, thank you for, for sharing that, Kristin,
it's great to have you on the podcast. Jay, go ahead and, uh,
introduce yourself to our listeners.
Sure. My name is Jay Leba. I've got about 20 plus years of experience,
um, in the business world, mainly in finance and consulting.
I really have spent most of my career in opportunities that call for, uh,
disruptive innovation.
So typically industries that have stagnated over
10, 20, 30 year period, um, coming up with new products,
new services in order to become a market leader. Um, I've been at Sunbelt,
uh, since the very early days going on about, uh, six years now, uh,
focused initially on, uh, strategic partnerships. And in the last, uh,
three and a half, four years, I was, uh,
responsible and I currently am responsible for building, uh,
the dental practice, uh, from scratch in which we now have, uh,
roughly 9,000 dental practices, uh, nationwide,
including single point multi-unit, as well as, uh, ds o partners.
Great. Jay, thank you for being here. Uh,
it's great to have both of your perspectives, uh, to,
to really dive in here and learn more what's happening about what's happening in
the dental industry. So the, the, the first question I wanna pose, um, to you,
Kristen, maybe you can take it first and then Jay, we will check in with you,
but, uh,
there was a recent survey that found 67% of Americans can't afford a surprise
$400 expense. So, uh, with that context, can,
can you talk a little bit about Kristin, how the economic climate, um,
is sort of affecting dental practices today and how it's also influencing
patient behaviors when it comes to, you know, treatment acceptance and,
and cancellations, no-show things, things of that nature. Kristen, can you,
can you talk a little bit about that?
Sure.
We're already starting to see some of the same patterns that I remember from oh
eight, which was a hesitancy to accept the treatment that would involve any
out-of-pocket expenses, um,
which also led to a decrease in comprehensive treatment and more of a focus on
emergency care for our patients.
And financial constraints can really result in delaying or avoiding dental
appointments altogether. And that's what we're challenged with,
is trying to figure that out for our patients,
similar to what we were doing in oh eight,
continuing to figure out new ways to be embedded for our patients to be able to
get access to care.
Can you talk a little bit more, Kristen, about that,
that inventiveness and we'll, we'll dive in further here too, but just to,
to lay, lay some more groundwork for the conversation to come.
Focusing on retention of patients, you know,
trying to be open later, more convenient hours,
trying to find ways for patients to be able to f afford the, you know,
the higher dollar treatment that they need in a monthly payment plan.
Those are some of the ways that we've been able to help our patients say yes to
dentistry, even when it's, you know, an economic, uh,
situation that we're faced with as we are again today.
Thank you, Kristen. Um, Jay, uh, does what Kristen share, um,
shared sort of resonate with what you're seeing in the industry as well?
Yeah, it definitely does. I mean, I work with, and,
and my team works with literally hundreds of groups, uh,
practices throughout the country. And what Kristen is seeing is,
is very similar to what they're seeing, which is higher cost for patients, less,
uh, discretionary, uh, funds to be used for dentistry.
And the bottom line is the, the stat that you quoted before,
67% of Americans can't afford a $400 emergency expense.
The average dental treatment is roughly about $1,200.
So if 67% can't afford 400,
imagine what the percentage is that can't afford 1200.
So the assumption that has to be made is that a huge percentage of the
patients that are walking in that office door, of course, need access to care,
need that treatment, but they can't afford it. And it's up to us,
it's up to the dental practices, the DSOs,
the single unit practices independence in order to give them options,
give the patients great options in order to get the dental care that they need.
And really sort of side stepped,
overcome some of those economic barriers right there. There's,
there's a lot of work dental organizations can do, um, to, to,
to mitigate these challenges. You can't go out and fix, uh,
fix the broader economic trends, right?
But you can do some work within your own organization to,
to take care of your patients and expand access. Right, Jay?
Absolutely. I mean, it's not just, it's not just keeping costs down, right?
Because everyone is trying to do that and, and rightfully,
but you also as an organization have to go on offense a bit,
meaning you have to try to drive more production via providing
more, uh, patients access to care.
Thank you, Jay. And Kristen, turning back to you now, you know, you,
you talked a little bit about, about the work, um, you, you're, you're doing to,
to to sort of navigate some of some of the economic challenges and, and, and,
and work with patients. But can you talk more about the, the,
the steps light wave dental is,
is doing to really mitigate the impact of inflation and,
and sort of grow top line revenue there?
Absolutely. We are focused on clinical hiring and retention. We've got, um,
I believe 90%, uh, clinical hiring retention right now currently in our company.
And that comes through a lot of leading and mentoring and
growth pathways for our providers.
One of the things that I am really impressed with,
with our company is strategic partner program that we have,
I believe launched it last year, if I'm not mistaken.
It was designed to have orthodontists doing the clin checks for GP
doctors so that the patients never have to leave their home dental
office, but they are able to get the ortho care that they would like.
And we have the support of orthodontists within our company helping to make sure
the patient gets the best quality of care. That has been one of, I believe,
one of the main things that I've seen to really help us drive top line growth.
Thank you for sharing that, Kristin. And, and I also understand that, you know,
you've,
you've recently had that a really successful implementation of new financing
technology just within the last several months.
Can you just share more about the, the process of,
of implementing integrating this new solution, um, and,
and the impact it's had on on your business, your staff, um, and patients?
Of course.
Our company is unique in that we lead our dental practices into sound business
decisions without forcing that on on them.
So it does require us to slow down and get their buy-in before we're able
to really introduce any new services to their practice.
And the way that I'm able to get the buy-in is from my own experience being,
you know, a clinician myself doing the treatment planning for Ms. Jones, that,
um, ultimately in my experience would get a no to patient financing.
So I noticed that I was more hesitant to offer options for the patient,
uh,
when it came to patient financing because I wasn't well trained on what to say.
And then when I did get the guts to do it, Ms.
Jones got declined and then I had to, you know, deal with that, um,
emotional response of knowing this patient. So being so close to, um,
the fire on this really kind of made it a little more challenging for me as a
clinician to, you know, feel good about how we're going to get Ms.
Jones to the dentistry that she needs and wants. Um,
and so that was my experience with that. And then, um, partnering with Sunbelt,
I was able to see, you know, we're currently a 94% approval rate.
That's almost a guaranteed yes at this point for our patients that are accepting
treatment through Sunbelt.
And that gives our teams the confidence to offer it because they don't have to
worry about having to, you know, pat Ms. Jones on the back and say, I'm sorry,
we can't help you.
I imagine having conversations, I'm sorry, can't help you.
Things like that just take a real emotional toll on staff, right?
Yes. For the practice level, that is really what it's all about for us,
is providing care. That's why we go into dentistry, you know, we,
we build relationships with these patients and when we have to turn patients
away, that is really, really hard.
So the emotional response at the practice level is probably the number one thing
that I've seen the change in tone for our teams to be able to feel confident and
that they are able to help Ms.
Jones is really making the difference in us being able to provide more
care.
Excellent. Preston, thank you for sharing that. And then I, you know,
you mentioned sort of buy-in here, um,
which makes me wanna dive a little bit deeper and ask a,
a question about change management. So, uh, you know,
anytime you integrate new solutions, new technology, there's,
there's a period of, uh, of change management.
Can you talk a little bit about Kristen,
what operational or or change management adjustments you made and,
and just share a little bit more about how your team's adapted through that
process?
It started with awareness. You know, our,
our teams don't really know the stats that we're sharing right now. They,
they just assume, you know,
that people walk out the door and say no to treatment because they failed or
they didn't do something right.
And it is a little bit more challenging for us to determine why case acceptance
isn't greater in dentistry.
But when we remove this financial barrier and we start to see that case
acceptance goes up when we remove that, you know, financial barrier,
I think the awareness of the need for our patients drives
buy-in of the team, but it doesn't stop there.
The training of the team is another key aspect to really making this
work. Um,
without proper training and communication from the team member to the patient,
it can be a really challenging conversation,
but it doesn't have to be with a little bit of training.
And so we focused on that, the desire to wanna help people,
but also the ease of use of being able to, you know,
get the financial arrangements made without taking a lot of chair time,
patient or practice time has also been another way that it's just really
been an easy transition for our teams because, uh,
those few things that we've done in the change management process have really
worked and gone so smoothly.
Jay, turning to you now and staying on the,
this change management component for, for a little bit.
Can you talk a little bit about, you know, expand upon what, what Kristen said.
Does that, does that experience sort of track across other partners you have?
Um, can you just talk about what,
what challenges do you see here in terms of change management among,
among your partners?
Sure. I think the biggest thing, and I think Kristen touched on it quite well,
is really changing of behaviors. Cuz really what,
what the front office team has done the past 25 years is they've tried to roll
a 200 pound boulder up a hill, and we all know that's kind of impossible.
You try it once, it doesn't work, so you stop doing that.
And the same thing thing with patient financing.
Historically there's been anywhere from 25 to 35, if you're lucky,
maybe 40%, um, approval with, with some of the historical, uh,
providers. So what happens is if three out of 10 or four out of 10 get approved,
and obviously most get declined as a front office team member,
you're just going to stop offering it. It's human nature, right?
Because it's embarrassing for you to offer a solution to someone
for which they get declined and it's even more embarrassing for the person
across the counter, right?
The patient who needs that care to get declined as well.
So you just stop offering it. So here we come and we are saying,
and you, you, you heard, you know, Kristen's results today, 94%,
nearly everyone that walks in the door can get the care they need,
but there is a changing of behaviors that's needed by the front office
staff. And I think the way Kristen does it, which is amazing,
which is it's kind of like, you know,
show me like it works like we're approving people,
people are getting the care they need, case acceptance is going up, so I'm,
you know what, I'm gonna offer it to the next patient,
I'm gonna offer it to the next patient. Um, and that's kind of,
that muscle memory gets built and that's how wrist and
lightweight have been so successful, uh, so far with Sunbelt.
So changing of behaviors is, is I think the first one. The, the other one,
the other key point I think is the tone at the top.
So does executive management kind of tie in access to care
with patient financing? Cuz it's very, very tightly integrated, right?
If you want more patients to have access to care,
they need more flexible ways to make payments and patient financing
should be one of the primary ways to do that. So I think if you, if they're,
you focus on those two things, changing of the behaviors and tone at the top,
the partners that we work with that focus on those two things are extremely
successful in implementing Sun.
So some really great advice throughout this portion of the conversation and,
and, and let's keep that the, the, that going for a,
as we call out the conversation here, I wanna really think about advice, tips,
uh, stuff, people listening to this, this,
this podcast can really take away and, and bring through their own practice.
So the question I wanna pose to both of you is for leaders out there who might
be listening to this,
who are really motivated to integrate a new financing solution in their
organizations, what advice would you offer?
What do they really absolutely need to know to be successful? Kristen,
do you wanna start us off here?
Sure.
I would say find a platform that will focus on training the team for you.
So that takes, you know,
that away from you having to be the one to really drive those results and hold
the team accountable.
The training to me is the key to success and finding a partner
that can help you get such approval rates will make all the difference when
it gets to the team's level of wanting to keep this process going.
So, so a lot about training there and really, you know, taking that,
taking that worry, that concern off, off the plate of the practice, right?
Yes.
Jay, what would you say?
I think in a mirroring that a little bit, um, is how,
if you're looking for a solution,
ultimately who's going to be offering that solution? It's the front office team,
right? The, the tcs the office manager, maybe the dental assistant.
How easy is it for them to use this solution if they've got
a flop back and forth between, you know, different, uh,
screens and they have to ask hard questions like, you know,
what's your income? Are you married versus single? What's your social?
If you have to ask like all these private questions and it's difficult for them,
they're not gonna wanna do it because like Kristen said,
you wanna kind of make it easy for them, right?
You want the process to kind of take care of itself.
So I think is how easy is the process for the staff because ultimately they're
going to drive the success or failure for the program.
And I think that the second thing is the approval rate, right? You know,
a slick technology solution is great,
but if if it approves 30% of the people, it doesn't really help many people.
You need a solution that's quick,
that's easy for the office to use and most importantly has a very,
very high approval rate so that it's inclusive so we can really,
the the promise that we're trying to make to the patients that you have a
problem, we have a solution,
you can actually get the access to dental care that you need.
Great point.
Yeah. I imagine that without that high approval rate, you know,
even with the best of intentions, it's not gonna be as as effective. Right?
Hundred percent correct. A hundred percent correct.
And, and, and, and just to close out here, is there anything we didn't get to,
you want to, you want to, you know, say before we,
we sign off any additional advice you'd like to share? Any,
any closing thoughts at all? Kristen, do you wanna go first.
In dentistry?
We've been resilient through these kind of economic situations in the past,
and I have no doubt we'll come up on the other side of this even better than
where we were before.
Just would say that if you've tried solutions in the past that didn't seem to
work, don't give up. Try again. Try someone different, try, you know,
whatever it takes.
Continue to try to put the patient first and the rest will work out.
Thank you. Question Jay, what would you say?
I would say that, you know, we're, we're in these tough times, but you know,
as people were tough, as you know, practitioners we're tough.
We need to go on offense, we need to really drive access to care.
In order to do that,
one of the best ways to do it is through offering patient financing to all your
patients. Some people may want it, some people may not want it. Similar to,
you know, going through the checkout line,
a target where you get offered the red card every time.
This should be the defacto method or policy for offices
to get more patients the access to, to care that they need.
Excellent. A great place to close. Jay Kristen, it,
it's been a pleasure speaking with you today. Thank you.
Thank you both so much for joining me. Thank you. Thank you Brian.
I'd also like to thank Sun Bitt as well for sponsoring this episode.
You can tune into more podcasts from Becker's Healthcare by visiting our podcast
page. Have a wonderful rest of your day.