Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / AI, Insurance Challenges, and the Future of Independent Dentistry with Dr. Krista Kappus

Transcript

AI, Insurance Challenges, and the Future of Independent Dentistry with Dr. Krista Kappus · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

• 0:02
  - Oral health is finally being recognized as part
• 0:04
  - of whole person care. And at the same
• 0:06
  - time, digital tools and AI are reshaping how
• 0:09
  - practices prevent disease, engage patients, and grow.
• 0:13
  - DSOs are expanding, independent
• 0:15
  - practices are proving their staying power, and investment
• 0:18
  - is accelerating across the sector.
• 0:20
  - Dental leadership has never been more complicated
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  - or more consequential.
• 0:25
  - Ecker's fifth annual future of dentistry roundtable brings
• 0:28
  - together more than 250
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  - executive level attendees
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  - and 90 plus speakers for two days of
• 0:34
  - sessions in Chicago, all built to help leaders
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  - benchmark their priorities,
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  - stress test their strategies, and walk away with
• 0:41
  - a clearer picture of where this industry is
• 0:43
  - heading and how to position for it. Join
• 0:45
  - us September fourteenth and fifteenth in Chicago.
• 0:49
  - Register on our events page at wwwbeckersdental.com
• 0:53
  - by clicking on the events tab in the
• 0:55
  - upper right.
• 0:57
  - Hello. This is Ariana Portallatin with the Becker's
• 1:00
  - Dental and DUSA Ruby podcast. I'm thrilled to
• 1:02
  - be joined today by doctor Krista Kappas of
• 1:04
  - Fitch Mountain Dental in California. Doctor Kappas, thank
• 1:07
  - you so much for being here today. It's
• 1:08
  - good to have you on our podcast again.
• 1:10
  - Thanks for having me.
• 1:12
  - Great.
• 1:12
  - To start us off, for our listeners, can
• 1:14
  - you introduce yourself and tell us a little
• 1:16
  - bit about your background?
• 1:18
  - Yeah. My name is Krista Kappas.
• 1:20
  - I am a dental practice owner in Healdsburg,
• 1:23
  - California, so Northern California.
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  - I went to the University of Michigan School
• 1:28
  - of Dentistry,
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  - graduated in 2014. So I've been out for
• 1:31
  - about twelve years now.
• 1:33
  - Awesome. Thank you so much.
• 1:35
  - First question for you here. What are some
• 1:37
  - of the biggest issues that you're following in
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  - the industry this year?
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  - Gosh. That's that's a loaded question.
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  - So many issues. So I think we're finding,
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  - a lot of pushback from dental insurances.
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  - I mean, I think
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  - most anybody you ask is probably gonna give
• 1:55
  - you the same line of of the general
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  - issues where we have staffing issues. We have
• 2:00
  - staffing education issues.
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  - We have,
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  - fee increases in general,
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  - cost increases.
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  - I'd say our our dental supplies have gone
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  - up probably 5%
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  - just this year alone.
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  - You know, building cost, maintenance, everything. I mean,
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  - I think, you know, the world in general,
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  - everything's just costing more.
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  - And dental insurances, of course, are paying less
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  - and reimbursing less. So, you know, that's that's
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  - the joy as well.
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  - Yeah. I'd love to hear more about that
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  - topic. I know this is pretty much the
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  - same thing that so many other practices are
• 2:35
  - dealing with across the country. How are you
• 2:38
  - approaching this issue? How are you going about
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  - making sure that your practice is still financially
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  - stable?
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  - Yeah. I think,
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  - one thing that I've really
• 2:49
  - got I've had to dive in a little
• 2:51
  - bit more than I I had in the
• 2:53
  - past. I think when,
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  - business is going great, money is just flowing
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  - in, you just kinda cruise, and,
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  - sometimes you don't notice,
• 3:02
  - things that you might be missing out on.
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  - So in the last couple of months, we've
• 3:06
  - been having some AR issues and had to
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  - dive in. And so I I've been actually
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  - looking more than I've ever looked at insurance
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  - denials, insurance claims submissions, and things like that.
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  - And it's it's been,
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  - really interesting to see
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  - how many
• 3:23
  - little nitpicky things are going on with with
• 3:26
  - insurances. So I found,
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  - a couple of examples recently that I just
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  - was not aware of. You know, you hear
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  - things like missing tooth clauses and situations like
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  - that. But,
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  - alternative,
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  - benefits available,
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  - seems to be a more recent one. So,
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  - you know, if a patient has dental implant
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  - coverage,
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  - they
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  - might not actually have the dental implant coverage
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  - if the insurance company thinks that they should
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  - have a partial denture instead,
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  - which seems to be, you know, entirely up
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  - to the
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  - insurance company to decide that or not.
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  - I've actually started to recently use Claude
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  - AI,
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  - to help us with our co pays.
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  - So I I think there's so many little
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  - weaselly
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  - things in these benefit breakdowns that are just
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  - really easy to miss when you're putting that
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  - together.
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  - And that's been super helpful because it can
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  - it can point those out to us, a
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  - lot quicker than, you know, having somebody read
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  - through their,
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  - all of their
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  - potential benefits on there.
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  - And, also, I mean, cost in general. I
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  - mean, I think one of the easy ones
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  - is,
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  - your your dental supply costs.
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  - I think, traditionally,
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  - you always had your
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  - we still do. We have our Henry Schein
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  - rep and our Patterson rep, and we work
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  - with them to some extent. But there's so
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  - many other dental supply companies out there, and
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  - I think some really cool
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  - marketplaces
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  - available,
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  - like, NET 32 is one,
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  - where it kinda just scours the Internet for
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  - all the dental products, and you can compare
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  - costs a little bit easier. So it's it's
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  - not as simple. It takes a little bit
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  - more hands on approach to search and search
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  - a couple of different marketplaces, but,
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  - I think that is one area where you
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  - can cut some costs.
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  - That's great. Thank you so much for, sharing
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  - that insight there. Next question for you here.
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  - What are you most excited about when it
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  - comes to dentistry right now, and is there
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  - anything that's making you nervous?
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  - Most excited for dentistry. I think AI is
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  - just huge right now, and I think it's
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  - gonna help us out so much. Right now,
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  - we have Eaglesoft, which,
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  - I just feel like it's such an outdated
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  - system. And I know, similarly with Dentrix,
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  - they're no longer supporting Dentrix and moving to
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  - a new system. But I think
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  - as AI grows and gets more intelligent, I
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  - have a feeling we're gonna have a,
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  - just
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  - a more cohesive dental software that ideally
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  - will merge better with our insurances,
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  - be able to better do co pays,
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  - better,
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  - insurance verification, just more connected in general.
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  - Right now, we have
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  - I mean, we we work with,
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  - Pearl,
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  - which is,
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  - imaging software. So I think that's been really
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  - helpful for our hygienists and our dental assistants
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  - and just patient education and pointing out areas
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  - where there's decay, potential decay,
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  - but it doesn't integrate to our current software.
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  - So I think, you know, as we start
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  - to see more of this, AI in the
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  - dental world, I think ideally, we'll get some
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  - sort of, you know,
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  - cloud based software that can integrate these all
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  - a little bit better versus having, you know,
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  - your 10 separate applications
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  - you have to open up.
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  - Yeah. Yeah.
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  - It brings up a an interesting question that
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  - I haven't discussed with anyone else before, but
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  - I'd love to know. This might have a
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  - a long answer to it, but would love
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  - to get into it further. Sure. Yeah.
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  - You mentioned, you know, what you would like
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  - to see. Is there, like, a,
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  - wish list that you have,
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  - for AI beyond that? Just stuff that you
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  - would like to see it
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  - do and help you out with on the
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  - dental side?
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  - Yeah. I think there's there's so much out
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  - there, but nothing that's really integrated together.
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  - So, I mean, I think, you know, anything
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  - I'm saying I haven't come up with. It's
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  - it's out there. It exists. It's just, you
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  - know, you have to have a company for
• 7:16
  - this, a company for that. And I think
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  - if there was,
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  - an integrated software that kind of combine that
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  - all
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  - of alright. We've got our our note taking
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  - AI. It's we have our
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  - Alexa
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  - sort of thing in every room where you're
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  - doing your patient x x, explanations. And at
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  - the end of the appointment, it summarizes your
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  - notes. It's all put in there. You can
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  - edit them how you see fit, but it's
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  - everything we talked about for the most part.
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  - I think integrating your your dental
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  - imaging software,
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  - integrating
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  - our insurance verification
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  - software,
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  - and having better,
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  - ways to
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  - access,
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  - your insurance portals.
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  - And right now, we have, you know, about
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  - 9,000 different insurance portals, and
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  - everyone's got a different different password and different
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  - ways to get into it. So I think
• 8:07
  - having, you know, a better integrated system. Right
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  - now, we've got the CAQH
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  - for your,
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  - just updating your information for all the insurances.
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  - And I think if
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  - we had something like that for dental insurances
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  - in general, just some sort of cohesive dashboard.
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  - But it's just I I think
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  - there's so many different
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  - little and
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  - and I'm sure people are are,
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  - better at this than me and, have already
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  - kind of mastered some of this. But, I
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  - mean, to to submit our insurance, we have
• 8:38
  - a company, remote light, that sends it to
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  - Vine, that sends it to the insurance. And
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  - I think just having one cohesive unit to
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  - do that, we don't have 10 different companies
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  - that we've gotta make sure we're updating and
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  - everything is working correctly to make sure we
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  - get paid would be ideal.
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  - Yeah. Yeah. Definitely.
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  - Was there anything that makes you nervous as
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  - well?
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  - Yeah.
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  - I mean, I think AI in general. I
• 9:02
  - mean, how how much do we hear about
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  - how it's using all of our water, how
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  - it's using you know, it's gonna it's gonna
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  - outsmart us and take over us.
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  - I mean, sure. I think that's there's definitely
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  - some fear involved
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  - in that.
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  - But in general, I think,
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  - AI is gonna help us in what we're
• 9:22
  - doing. I think it's gonna probably cut back
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  - on,
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  - certain,
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  - jobs that we have. So, I mean, that
• 9:31
  - could be a workforce issue in the future
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  - for sure. You know, if there's certain things
• 9:35
  - like, alright. We don't need as many billing
• 9:37
  - specialists anymore because we've got AI that's taking
• 9:39
  - over that.
• 9:41
  - Maybe in the future, our phone services get
• 9:43
  - better where we only need one person upfront
• 9:46
  - answering the phone because AI is handling a
• 9:47
  - lot of the scheduling and,
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  - simple questions. So I think from a workforce
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  - standpoint, that could be an issue. But generally
• 9:56
  - speaking, I'd say not not too fearful.
• 9:59
  - Last question for you here, what will the
• 10:01
  - most effective healthcare leaders need to be successful
• 10:04
  - in the next two to three years?
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  - I think like you need to be watching
• 10:09
  - out and just be looking at every little
• 10:11
  - moving part in dental.
• 10:13
  - It's we're not at a time right now
• 10:15
  - where you can just cruise and be comfortable.
• 10:17
  - I think it's a time where a lot
• 10:19
  - of stuff is shifting
• 10:20
  - for the good and the bad. And so
• 10:22
  - I think just being really aware of all
• 10:24
  - the moving parts in your dental office and
• 10:26
  - really focusing in on on everything and, you
• 10:29
  - know, ideally, we'll get to a point where
• 10:31
  - we don't have to do that forever, but
• 10:33
  - I just think with all the changing, shifting
• 10:36
  - times, and
• 10:37
  - economy kind of in an unstable position,
• 10:40
  - you just really have to be looking at
• 10:43
  - every aspect of your business and not just
• 10:45
  - focusing in on the dentistry right now.
• 10:47
  - Okay.
• 10:48
  - Well, that is all I have for you
• 10:49
  - today, Doctor. Capas. Thank you so much for
• 10:51
  - joining, us today. It's always a pleasure speaking
• 10:53
  - with you. So great to have you on
• 10:55
  - the podcast again and looking forward to connecting
• 10:57
  - with you again in the future. Yeah. Awesome.
• 10:59
  - Well, thank you.