Key Takeaways
- Timing matters: Delayed dental care can lead to more complex and potentially more costly treatment.
- Look beyond enrollment: Review how employees are actually using their dental benefits throughout the year.
- Make preventative care clear: Employees should understand what’s covered and why routine care matters.
- Focus on earlier intervention: A stronger dental strategy helps encourage care before problems become urgent.
- Keep engagement going year-round: Open enrollment is only the starting point for helping employees get value from their benefits.
Open enrollment gives HR and benefits leaders an opportunity to look beyond which benefits are being offered and ask a more important question: Are those benefits working as strategically as they could be?
Employee dental benefits are a good example. Plan design, employee understanding, patterns of care, and the timing of treatment can all influence the value employers and employees ultimately get from the benefit.
That is especially important when routine dental care is delayed. Problems that may have been addressed earlier can become more complex, potentially leading to more extensive treatment, emergency care, and time away from work.1,2
As you evaluate your dental strategy for open enrollment, here are five questions worth asking.
For HR and benefits leaders, evaluating dental benefits during open enrollment means looking beyond plan design to consider utilization, access to care, employee understanding, preventive care, and year-round engagement.
1. Are delayed dental visits leading to higher-cost care?
For benefits leaders, one of the most important questions isn’t simply how much employees are using their dental benefits, but when they are using them.
When routine and preventative care is delayed, dental problems can progress until they require more extensive or emergency treatment. That difference can have a significant financial impact.
According to the American Dental Association, emergency department visits for dental care cost approximately three times as much as a visit to the dentist.[3]
For insurers and employers responsible for healthcare costs, that creates an important consideration: are employees receiving care early enough to address issues before they become more serious and costly?
Creating more opportunities to identify and address oral health needs earlier can help shift care away from higher-cost emergency settings and toward routine dental treatment.
As open enrollment approaches, benefits teams should consider whether their current strategy supports earlier, more appropriate care rather than waiting until a problem becomes urgent.
2. What is your dental benefits data actually telling you?
Open enrollment is a natural time to look beyond enrollment numbers and examine how employees are using their dental benefits throughout the year.
Depending on the information available from your carrier or benefits partners, look for patterns in the types of services employees are receiving.
How much utilization is preventative? Are employees regularly receiving exams and cleanings? Are restorative or more extensive procedures representing a significant portion of claims? Are there patterns that suggest employees may be entering the dental system only after a problem has developed?
The objective is not necessarily to drive every utilization metric higher. It is to understand whether the way employees are using the benefit aligns with the outcomes the organization wants to encourage.
That gives benefits leaders a more useful open-enrollment conversation than simply asking whether employees enrolled.
Instead, ask: Is our dental benefit producing the kind of utilization we want to see?
3. Do employees understand the preventative dental care already included in their plan?
Open enrollment asks employees to absorb a lot of information at once.
They may be comparing premiums, deductibles, networks, medical plans, dental plans, vision coverage, voluntary benefits, and more. In the process, important details about how to actually use those benefits can easily get lost.
Dental benefits are no exception.
Employees may enroll in a plan without fully understanding which preventative services are covered, how frequently they can use them, or why receiving routine care matters.
That makes communication an important part of the benefits strategy.
Rather than limiting dental communications to plan selection, employers can use open enrollment as an opportunity to reinforce the value of preventative care.
Do employees know what their plan includes? Do they understand the difference between preventative and restorative treatment? Are they being encouraged to use routine services before they have an urgent dental need?
The goal is to move employees from “I have dental benefits” to “I understand how to get value from my dental benefits.”
4. Does your benefits strategy support earlier intervention?
A dental plan determines what is covered, but the broader dental benefits strategy can influence when employees seek care.
That distinction matters.
The National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research notes that untreated tooth decay can lead people to seek care in hospital emergency rooms, where treatment may address immediate symptoms without resolving the underlying dental problem.1
For employers, that raises a strategic question: Does the current approach encourage employees to address dental needs before they reach that point?
Open enrollment can be a good time to evaluate whether the dental benefit is positioned primarily as financial protection when something goes wrong—or as a resource employees should actively use to maintain their oral health throughout the year.
A stronger preventative strategy focuses on creating opportunities for employees to identify and address issues earlier, when treatment may be less extensive.
That may mean looking not only at the insurance plan itself, but also at the programs and resources that can improve employees’ access to dental care.
5. Does your dental strategy encourage meaningful engagement throughout the year?
Open enrollment may be when employees choose their benefits, but the effectiveness of those benefits is determined over the months that follow.
A dental plan that receives attention only during enrollment season can easily fade into the background once the new benefits year begins.
That is why dental engagement should extend beyond enrollment.
Are employees reminded about the preventative services available to them? Are there opportunities throughout the year to re-engage employees around their oral health? Are communications tied to clear actions employees can take?
Research has also connected oral health with workplace productivity. A CDC-published study found that adults reporting poor oral health were significantly more likely to lose work hours because of unplanned dental visits.2
Keeping preventative dental care visible throughout the year can help shift the benefit from something employees simply enroll in to something they actively use.
Open Enrollment Is an Opportunity to Look Beyond the Plan
A strong employee dental benefits strategy is about more than choosing a plan and communicating enrollment dates.
It is also about understanding when and how employees are receiving care.
Are dental dollars going toward earlier, preventative treatment or increasingly complex care? Do employees understand the benefits already available to them? Is the organization making preventative care part of the year-round benefits conversation?
For HR and benefits leaders, these questions can help turn open enrollment into an opportunity to evaluate not only what the dental plan costs, but how effectively it supports employees throughout the year.
Dentists on Demand helps employers bring preventative dental care directly to the workplace, creating another way for employees to engage with their existing dental benefits and prioritize routine care during the workday.
Looking for ways to strengthen your employee dental benefits strategy? Connect with Dentists on Demand to learn how onsite dental care can support greater access to preventative care and more meaningful benefits engagement.
Sources
1 National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), “Oral Health in America – April 2022 Bulletin.”
Discusses the economic impact of untreated tooth decay and the use of hospital emergency departments for untreated dental problems.
https://www.nidcr.nih.gov/research/oralhealthinamerica/section-3a-summary
2 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Preventing Chronic Disease, “Hours Lost to Planned and Unplanned Dental Visits Among US Adults.”
Examines the relationship between oral health, dental visits, and lost work hours among U.S. adults.
https://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2018/17_0225.htm
3 American Dental Association, “Emergency Department Referrals.”
Reports that emergency department visits for dental care cost approximately three times as much as a dental-office visit and discusses shifting dental care toward appropriate dental settings.
https://www.ada.org/resources/community-initiatives/action-for-dental-health/emergency-department-referrals