Dental Talent – 5 Ways to Develop a Child Friendly Dental Practice

Making your dental practice child friendly has a lot of distinct advantages. After all, doing so will help increase your client base by a significant degree. However, being a paediatric dentist also comes with a lot of potential pitfalls! 

Dealing with children can be a challenge, and it is more challenging to deal with young ones that have never been to a dental clinic. Still, developing a relationship with young patients early means you get a massive chance of keeping them for a long time. As such, it will pay off to make a good impression to first-time dental patients.

If you want to appeal to kids and parents, here are tips to make your practice child-friendly: 

Practice Effective Patient Communication

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Effective patient communication is helpful for your practice, especially if you want to be seen as a child-friendly clinic. The first step towards this would be to sending the right message to the parents of your potential clients! 

You will likely get phone calls or emails for most of your inquiries—and it won’t be the children doing these, but their parents. Communicate effectively and know as many details as you can about their children before they come for their first appointment. You also need to inform parents what they should or shouldn’t do to make the dental appointment go as smoothly as possible, especially if it’s their child’s first time to see a dentist. 

Spruce Up the Treatment Area

You don’t need to go all out and turn the entire facility into a child haven. It can be as simple as installing TV screens over the dental chairs and setting them up to show cartoons and other kid-friendly movies. 

If you have enough space, you can set up a separate area that’s just for your younger patients, especially if you also accept adults into your practice. That way, the children will have a dedicated space for their treatments that will help them feel more at ease. 

You can even decorate the room with a few toys and cute wallpaper to make them feel comfortable. Aside from that, you can provide fluffy blankets to keep the little ones cosy as they wait for their turn to be over.

Explain to the Kids What You’re Doing

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On the day of the appointment, don’t patronise the child. Instead, explain to them the procedures in a child-friendly manner. Avoid complicated jargon and keep a bright and cheerful tone to help keep them at ease. By using a language that they can understand easily,  they can feel a bit more comfortable with what you’re doing—avoiding the plausible trauma of going back later on for follow-up check-ups!

Provide Options

Give the child some options because this will make them feel valued. For example, you can ask them what flavour of fluoride they want or what TV show or movie they want to watch. 

If kids get to have a say in these decisions, they will feel more invested in the process, which will make things easier for you as well! 

Give Rewards

Let the children choose a sticker, a toy, or whatever it is that you offer little ones after undergoing a successful dental treatment. The reward system always works with children, and this helps them stay motivated. 

In doing so, the next dental visit will not be as daunting as the first. Who knows; they might even look forward to it! 

The Bottom Line

Making your dental practice child-friendly presents plenty of growth opportunities. However, it is not easy to deal with younger patients. By following these tips, you can hone your practice into a child-friendly one that will grow your client base and your network. It takes patience, determination, and a love for children to develop a child-friendly practice—so don’t take this decision lightly!

Are you looking to expand your dental practice by adding on experienced associate dentists and dental nurses in the UK? Dental Talent is one of the biggest job boards for dentistry. Connect with us today and find the right talent for your dental practice today!