Delta Dental
Designing a new way to credential, contract, and onboard providers
While insurance payers promise to help practices grow and thrive, they are frequently seen as a necessary evil by dental providers, instead of a resource.
I designed a modernized journey that leveraged provider data maintenance, real-time verification, on-demand specialists, and more in order to improve the first meaningful experience between practice and payer. I facilitated conversations and workshops between practitioners, in-office staff, Delta Dental employees, and leadership to overhaul the outdated current state and create a simplified digital experience for providers.
Overview
My Role & Contribution
I was the service designer on this project and my work focused on the experiences of both the provider and payer.
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Over the course of 24+ client/provider co-creation sessions, I designed numerous lo-fi/hi-fi concepts & ideated on them throughout the project.
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I also assisted in the alignment and optimization of Delta Dental’s operations (people, process, and technology) to better support provider journeys.
Research Approach
We conducted a payer-agnostic, blind study through 1:1 interviews, an online ethnographic research study, and follow-up survey with dental providers around the united states to learn more about their perceptions of their current experiences.
Research Findings
We found that providers equated the trust of a payer to the ease of experience in credentialing, gaining access to potential patients, and understanding eligibility of being paid for services. Disconnects within the experience create distrust and a poor overall perception of payers to the point where some providers avoid working with payers altogether.
Through our research we identified:
Which led to the creation of a static map deliverable
This deliverable included our research findings as well as mindsets, personas, root issues, goals, flow disruptors, and more.
A Creative Approach
In addition to the static map, I transformed an insight-rich and content-dense journey map into an illustrated picture that brought each moment to life through rooms filled with characters and objects that you would find in a typical dental office.
Future State Design
We collectively co-created distinct future-state experiences for different persona use cases and brought them to life through the creation of prototypes and the resulting service blueprint of capabilities, and ultimately converging them into a prioritized set of concepts and an outcome-based horizon roadmap.
Expected Outcomes
While the results of these changes won’t come until they are implemented, there are expectations of increases in measurable value for customers, employees, and the organization.