Smilezone

Besides running your Zug dental practice "Smilezone", you are also a co-founder of "Zahncal Apps Ltd": What is the purpose of this company?

Jeong-Woo Yoo: All dentists are challenged by increasingly demanding customer expectations and namely by the digitalisation of the relationship between the dentist and the customer. In business outside medicine, this challenge has long been met with the methods of digitalised "Customer Relationship Management CRM". Zahncal", which I co-founded, aims to offer dentists a "Patient Relationship Management PRM" adapted to the needs of dentistry, analogous to the digitalised CRM. Comparable to digitalised travel platforms such as Booking.com or Airbnb.com, "Zahncal" is developing a digitalised dentist platform where patients can quickly obtain comprehensive information and book appointments online. As with Booking.com or Airbnb.com, an important information tool about the dental practices is designed by the users themselves: the rating of the patient experience in the visited dental practice. In addition, "Zahncal" advises dental practices in the broad field of digital marketing via the internet and social media.

Why is dentistry still in its infancy in digitalised "Patient Relationship Management PRM"?
Jeong-Woo Yoo: There is a clear answer: in dental studies and in most dental practice, patients, their holistic needs and their trust are still far too little in the centre of attention. In dental studies, a lot is still taught about pathologies and the latest dental technology and hardly anything about how to respond to the needs of patients from a holistic point of view. The emerging digitalised "Patient Relationship Management PRM", which I promote, will change the way dentists view their patients. Especially when, in the future, quickly discoverable digital patient evaluations of dental practices separate the wheat from the chaff, as in other industries.

Your final message?
Jeong-Woo Yoo: Dentists are under pressure to adapt to changes in patient behaviour and expectations. The expectations are that patients want to be treated as customers: They want their specific needs to be taken into account in the treatments proposed. And: as oral health increases, the number of dental appointments per population due to medical problems always decreases. On the other hand, patients' expectations and wishes with regard to dental treatment are becoming more and more demanding. Moreover, due to the decline in cost coverage by public or private dental insurance, dental care usually has to be financed privately. Therefore, a dental practice that wants to excel in the competition for increasingly demanding patients has to deal with all the possibilities of digitalised "Patient Relationship Management PRM".