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From an audit score of 70 to an NPS of 100.
D'Institute is a premium dental clinic in Cluj-Napoca, with excellent doctors, leading-edge technology and a strong brand. The clinic already had excellent moments; our shared goal was for every patient to experience them, every time. Here's what we built together with the team over 14 months - and what the numbers told us.
12 months of collaboration
17 points of contact audited
11 key moments designed
4 measurement rounds
The excellence was there. The challenge was consistency.
We didn't start with "what do we need to change?" but with "what does the patient actually experience?". We assessed every point of contact - from online all the way to the emotional experience in the treatment room - on a scale from 0 to 100.
The results showed clear strengths - reception, technology, design - and a few moments with a lot of potential, exactly where the patient decides whether to start treatment.
What needed improving wasn't what the clinic offered, but how it reached each patient.
Patients weren't one single group.
We identified four patient types, with different needs, expectations and barriers. And most drop-offs happened before treatment began: at the consultation and when the plan was presented. 29.6% of patients dropped out before starting treatment, and 35% stopped after one or two procedures.
Eleven moments where trust is won - or lost.
- First contact
- Booking
- Confirmations
- Welcome
- Consultation
- Treatment proposal
- Clinic tour and decision
- Departure
- Treatment plan folder
- Treatment
- Follow-up
Not "let's be nicer" - concrete behaviours.
Reception: the experience starts before the patient arrives
Standards for booking, confirmations and the welcome, so every patient knows what comes next and feels expected.
In the treatment room: we listen before we propose
A consultation structure in which the patient’s need comes before the solution, and the treatment plan is presented as two options, with the differences explained.
The clinic tour: from non-existent to a deliberate moment
At the audit, the clinic tour didn’t exist as a moment of its own. It became a standard with a purpose, a structure and a clear owner, adapted to each patient type.
After the visit: follow-up with a purpose
Contact after the consultation, after key treatment stages and at the end, so the patient gets answers, not pressure.
"Two options doesn't mean selling two treatments. It means giving the patient back a sense of control."
Not recommendations on paper, but repeatable behaviours.
Change only becomes real when people start working differently. We worked with a pilot team and turned the standards into procedures and habits:
- Training for the clinical team and front desk
- Patient communication: active listening, clarity and handling difficult situations
- A communication guide, in Romanian and English
- Procedures for the key moments of the journey
You can't ask for a consistent patient experience from a team that doesn't have a consistent system.
We also measured the team's experience, in three internal studies. In the first round, in November 2025, with a 95% response rate, the team described a strong sense of "family" - but 45–50% reported stress, tension or fatigue, linked to organisation, predictability and communication.
100% response rate
- The team climate is described mostly as “good” or “very good”.
- Tensions are no longer about how work is organised, but about one-off situations.
- Perceptions of leadership have improved significantly.
- “You can feel the difference from last year.”
Without measurement, experience is just an opinion.
We measured NPS (how likely patients are to recommend the clinic) after the first visit, in four rounds, from November 2025 to summer 2026.
In the last measurement round, 86% of patients came to the clinic through a recommendation. At the start of the project, in June 2025, this wasn’t measured: patients were asked now and then, but the answers weren’t collected. NPS shows how likely patients are to recommend the clinic; this figure shows the recommendations that actually happened.
The same patients, two truths.
We used two methods, with the same patients, over the same period. Surveys are quantitative: patients give a score on a scale themselves, in a few seconds. Interviews are qualitative: a phone conversation of a few minutes, run by us, in which patients tell us what they experienced. The two said different things.
Survey · "How satisfied are you?"
NPS 100, zero detractors, zero critical suggestions. "Everything is by the book - so I have no suggestions!"
Interviews · "What would make you feel better?"
Around 70% of patients wished they had been listened to more closely before the medical recommendation.
In the interviews, patients weren't questioning the doctors' expertise. They wanted the decision to be built together. That's why the interviews, which we carry out as a neutral third party, remain essential - even when the numbers look excellent.
Three lessons for any clinic
The critical moment is the treatment proposal
That's where the patient decides whether to go ahead. A plan that's been explained isn't the same as a plan the patient owns.
Excellence has to be made consistent
The clinic already had excellent moments. The work was making them the rule, for every patient.
Scores and stories complete each other
NPS shows you the direction; interviews show you what to do next.
Start with a 45-minute conversation.
No pitch and no standard deck. You tell us what your patients experience today, and we tell you honestly where we see the biggest opportunities - and whether Fler is the right fit.
