Establishing a Patient Family Advisory Board in an Academic Dental Center

Problem (Why the Problem was Addressed)Dental School Clinics (DSC) strive to deliver patient-centered care within complex operational environments that can inadvertently marginalize patient and family voices.Surveys, while valuable, may not capture the nuance or empathy available through direct discussions.Our school is a mid-sized dental school that graduates 129 students per year.Our patient satisfaction surveys indicated that 99% or higher were satisfied and "would recommend us to their loved one."This left little information for improvement to our organization.Actionable patient feedback on critical, non-clinical, aspects of the patient experience such as parking, ease of scheduling, communication, and clinic navigation is often limited or unavailable.This lack of real-time information hinders the DSC's ability to rapidly identify and address systemwide concerns, hindering continuous improvement efforts and damaging the partnership between patients, families, and care providers.