The Dental Patient Experience Survey comprises online and paper questionnaires and a comprehensive report. When you purchase the software you will also get videos and help guides on the CD too.
The questionnaire
There are paper and online versions of the questionnaire contained in the survey software. It is up to you whether you run all paper, all online, or a mix of paper and online surveys.
Standard questionnaire - you can choose from a standard questionnaire which allows you to customise the questionnaire with your logo and the name of your practice.
Tailored questionnaire - or you can choose to tailor the survey more specifically to your practice by including the names of individual practitioners, treatments you offer, questions about the hygienist and so on.
You can add your logo and practice name to the standard questionnaire. Tailor further by adding the names of dentists, treatments you offer and so on (highlighted).
A master questionnaire which shows all the available questions (standard and additional) is included on the CD. We suggest that you print it off and choose which additional questions you would like to include before you start to set up your live survey. Or simply select the standard version when prompted to do so in the step by step survey set up.
Paper survey - the paper survey is between 1 and 3 pages in length, depending on whether you use the standard version or choose to customise it with additional questions. Paper questionnaires can be distributed to patients when they visit the practice, by post, or you could choose to interview some patients face to face.
Online survey - the online version of the questionnaire should take around 4 minutes for patients to complete. The simplest way to distribute the link to the online survey to patients is either in an email or from a page on your website.
What's in the questionnaire
The questions are based on those used successfully for a number of years by dental practices working with Sheila Scott, a leading dental business consultant.
The questionnaire is anonymous, it doesn't ask the patient for their name and address. It does ask the patient for age and gender, the length of time they have attended the practice, frequency of attending the practice and the type of patient they are (private/plan/NHS).
There are 26 categories of satisfaction and importance rating scales on different aspects of care offered by dental practices, and 3 categories where you can add your own.
There is also a section on awareness of, and interest in, other treatments and procedures your practice offers; you can customise up to 10 categories.
Other question areas include:
- How nervous the patient feels about visiting the dentist
- Questions about the hygienist
- Whether patients would recommend your practice
- What patients particularly like about the practice
- Suggestions for improvement
Gathering the feedback
The results from the online survey are automatically collected when the patient clicks on the submit button in a survey. The new results are added each time you run the report. For paper questionnaires you can manually enter the information into the online version of the survey. If you don't have the time or resource, we can enter the information from the paper questionnaires for you (contact us to find out more).
The report highlights areas where the practice is performing well and where there is room for improvement. An executive summary and suggested actions based on your performance are also included.
If you are using paper and online questionnaires the results from the surveys are combined when you run the report including results added manually from paper questionnaires.
In-depth report
The report shows the results for your practice and highlights where you are doing well and where patients think you could do better. In addition, results are also benchmarked* against a national average to show you how you are doing.
Your results are also turned into suggestions for actions you can take to improve the service your practice offers. These actions have been developed with Sheila Scott based on her extensive consultancy experience working with dental practices to improve their customer care and develop their business.
If you are an English practice the report provides a sound basis for Care Quality Commission reporting and compliance too.
Your results (in green) are benchmarked against a national average (red dot). 
"We found the Snap software easy to use. The online surveys gave our patients anonymity and the opportunity to be completely honest about our services. Compiling the data was straightforward and the reports clearly showed our results. I would recommend Snap Surveys to any dental practice wishing to acquire patient feedback without any headaches!"
Hannah Stuttard, The Bay Dental Practice, Penzance
Help and support
As well as comprehensive guides and videos contained on the CD and online, we also provide email support 09:00 - 17:00 Monday to Friday (excluding Christmas and Bank holidays).
General hints and tips on running a patient experience survey are also included on the CD to ensure the whole project runs smoothly for your patients and staff.
What you need to run the Dental Patient Experience Survey
Any PC with Windows XP, Vista,or 7 installed. If publishing online surveys you will also need an internet connection and a web browser such as Firefox or Internet Explorer (5.5 or later). Please note: this survey package does not run on Mac OSX (but patients can complete the online survey on Apple Mac, iPad etc).
You will need a PDF writer to save the report - our support team can advise customers about this if you do not already have a PDF writer installed on your PC.
Patients should not have any problems accessing the online surveys. Our questionnaires are designed to be accessible and user friendly. They run on PCs, Apple products and on all the main browsers including Internet Explorer 5.5 or later, Firefox and Safari.
* The benchmarking survey was carried out in February 2011 and is based on 1013 responses from UK adults who had visited the dentist in the previous 12 months.
