How Maximising Effi ciencies in Compliance Saves Time and Resource for Dental Practices A lex O’Neill, Head of Compliance at leading dental technology provider – Agilio Software – explains why dental practices across the country, now more than ever, need to look at the way they manage compliance and consider implementing Agilio’s latest product, iComply NextGen, to save up to 50% of the time usually spent on compliance. Having worked in dental compliance for over a decade, I have experienced fi rst-hand the major compliance shifts in the profession, including the introduction of the new Fundamental Standards in 2015. The implementation of these new regulations proved to be a real struggle for many dental practices, with initially 20% failing to pass CQC inspection at the time of implementation. However, despite the average passing rate dropping signifi cantly across the sector, we saw an impressive pass rate of 98% amongst our iComply members. Why? Because for the 40 years we’ve been developing iComply, we have always strived to meet the needs of modern dental practices and that’s exactly what we did back in 2015. We updated the software to refl ect the changing regulatory landscape and to support our practices to always be ready for a CQC inspection. Fast forward seven years, and we now have practice managers and dental practices who have a much better understanding of how to create and collate their evidence to meet the current CQC assessment requirements. However, they are now faced with new and unexpected challenges due to a range of factors including a global pandemic, and increased demand on the sector. In an ideal world, dental practices would be able to regularly dedicate time to stay on top of their compliance, however in reality, and with the current environment, this is not always possible. That’s why it’s important to have innovative and practical software to support them in making the most out of the time they have. At Agilio, we recognised this need and decided it was the time to advance our technology and to use our expertise in supporting the dental profession through this transitional period just like in 2015. And so, we developed iComply NextGen. Our initial thought was how we could involve those people who are using the system daily to help us develop and evolve iComply into something that would answer their needs and help them overcome the challenges they faced when handling their compliance. It became clear that prioritisation of key activities would make the biggest impact in saving dental practices much needed time and resource. With iComply NextGen, we’ve utilised our unique combination of industry expertise, ongoing research, and many years of experience to develop the revolutionary iComply priority ranking system. Using the inspection data we have collated over the years, we reviewed our list of activities and those that would not be required for passing a CQC/HIW inspection have been reclassifi ed as Operational or Optional rather than Compliance. This now gives our members the choice to decide whether they want to run their HR compliance and best practice management through iComply NextGen. Any activities that are mandatory for passing the CQC/HIW inspection will now be assigned with a suggested low, medium, or high priority level, depending on their importance. I am confi dent that this will be a game changing addition for dental practices getting ready for CQC/HIW inspection. Overall, I really want to see more and more dental practices taking advantage of the latest technology and software that is out there. Each of Agilio’s solutions have been developed and designed by experienced practice professionals, with the user in mind, saving them time without compromising on quality and allowing practices to focus on what matters the most, which is patient care and safety. Advertorial 71 The Dentist March 2022
The Dentist March 2022: Page 71
