TeleQ: the key to a calmer dental service in Linköping

In Sweden, Linköping’s dental team and practitioner service currently uses Aurora teleQ as its communication solution for managing patient contacts. In this article, we’ll hear stories from team members about how teleQ has simplified reception related tasks, and reduced stress amongst staff.  

“I think that I don’t really didn’t understand how messy it was before, it works so much more smoothly now”, says Linda Falk in discussion about her reflection on now the clinic previously felt. 

Linda has worked at Tandvårdsteam/Praktikertjänst in Linköping for a few years, spending fifty percent of her time as a clinic coordinator and fifty percent as a dental nurse. Most of her job involves personnel work, which includes taking responsibility for reception and organising schedules. Previously, Linda worked at Folktandvården and joined Praktikertjänst to introduce and integrate teleQ. 

“We started with teleQ in this clinic because I thought the system was good and the environment in the reception was stressful. Or what would you say, Anders?” Business manager Anders Falk, also Linda’s husband, enters the room and nods: 

“Yes, it was the system that we had experience with before and it seemed to be the smoothest. We also received a lot of positive feedback from those who had worked with teleQ, and the feedback was great.” 

An easier everyday life with advanced planning 

At Praktikertjänst in Linköping, twelve people are employed of which six are dental nurses. All the nurses work with teleQ, while a few of the nurses work the most with the system.  

“There was a completely different stress in the reception before”, says Linda. The phone kept ringing and then the answering machine went on, it was very stressful. Linda describes a daily task of having to listen to all the calls on the answering machine, write the contacts down, and then call each patient back. Today’s work environment is clearly calmer and above all, easier to plan. 

Linda portrays an environment which feels much calmer when patients are given a callback time. The clinic can control when they have time to manage incoming patient requests. As Linda concludes “it’s no longer phones that ring all the time, that stress disappeared.” 

Four button choices and one secret 

The system that Praktikertjänst has chosen with teleQ gives four choices for patients. The caller can choose between options such as: urgent pain, cancellation, rebooking and other questions. 

Linda tells us that the staff also have their own button selection in teleQ, which they call VIP. It’s the same phone number that patients call in, but with a secret selection that’s only disclosed to staff. 

This secret selection is used for example, if a staff member is sick, it’s recorded as a service call at the top of the list and the colleagues can see this listed when they come into work in the morning. Linda reports that she knows of a few Public Dental Services that use the same secret feature for their clinics for calls that shouldn’t end up in the patient queue. 

Linköping’s dental team recently sent out a survey and they received excellent feedback about their availability and accessibility, which is very positive, says Linda. According to her, there are older patients who may find teleQ slightly complicated, but on the other hand, the same audience calls into health centres that have a similar system. 

Linda explains further “I still think that most patients feel that having a communication system with teleQ is great, because they get a callback time. They can change their time and we can call them whenever it suits them best.” 

The introduction of Aurora teleQ at Praktikertjänst in Linköping has transformed the work environment for the dental nurse team. The new system not only offers a quieter and more manageable workflow, but also provides flexibility in scheduling and handling calls, allowing for adjustments based on staff availability or unforeseen circumstances. 

Find out more about how Aurora teleQ can enhance the operational efficiency of healthcare facilities, significantly improve the work conditions for nursing staff, and contribute to a more focused and patient-centric service delivery.