Clackamas Dental Consultant | Dental Practice Solutions

Stop Treating Your Schedule Like a Video Game; How to quit messing around and schedule your day for success

By: admin

August 21, 2018

Written by: Cindy Rogers, RDH, BS, OMT, Lead Hygiene and Business Coach.

I admit that while I was a scheduling coordinator, I was treating the schedule as if it were a video game. I would squish and stretch appointments to make them into pretty colored boxes that all fit nice and tightly together. I thought to create a productive day meant to have all the blocks filled in

It did not occur to me that these pretty little boxes basically controlled how the clinical teams’ day would run. Yes, they did often come up and kindly tell me to stop treating the schedule like a video game. I was told that they needed more time for this or that and that they could not possibly do a root canal at the same time as an extraction. I did not really understand what they meant. All I knew is that my pretty boxes needed to match up and their demands were messing that up.

After being reminded a few hundred times and working with some great consultants, I got better at this, but still did not truly understand why my boxes couldn’t just fit together nicely.

Now that I am a hygienist, I totally understand and often apologize to my previous team for all of the agony I must have caused them. I figure the reason they supported my transition into hygiene was so that I would get my payback.

Five main points to consider when planning your day

I would like to now share five points to consider when planning your day. These steps will help make your day successful both in production and in keeping your team mates on your side:

How much time does each procedure require?

Make a list of how much time each doctor needs for treatment procedures. (i.e., 60 minutes for one crown, 90 minutes for two)

What hygiene visits do NOT require an exam?

Typically, gum treatment appointments do not always require an exam. This is where you will be matching up time for the doctor to perform procedures that are hard to break away from.

What time of day do the providers prefer to perform longer procedures?

Let’s face it, some of us are morning people, and some of us aren’t. Why not do your patients a favor and find out.

What is a good time to save for new and emergency patients?

You should have time set aside for emergencies and new patients. You want to be able to offer these patients an opportunity to come in within 72 hours of them calling. Often, offices will block out time right before lunch. This way they have time to perform palliative treatment if needed, and a longer lunch if not.

What is your daily production goal for each provider?

Each provider should have a daily production goal. When you mix and match these procedures during the day, they should add up to reach this goal.

Now you want to match up the hygiene appointments that do not require an exam with the longer treatment appointments. These will be your rocks for the day and time where the providers can work uninterrupted.

Next, schedule treatment such as composites, and preventative hygiene. These will be your pebbles. After the foundation of rocks and pebbles are set in place, you can sprinkle some sand around them. Sand will be your crown seats, limited exams, and hygiene re-evaluations.

Each day should be balanced this way to assure your goals are met and that you are not running around crazy seating crowns and doing limited exams one day and sitting for 8 hours straight the next. Everyone on your team will be much happier and more productive. Remember that the daily schedule is your plan for the day. If you plan poorly, chances are your day will run poorly.

Written By: Coach Cindy Rogers, RDH

For many years Cindy has been an integral part of successfully building dental practices from the group up. Cindy is known for creating a harmonious work environment where the whole team looks forward to coming to work every day. The result of this has been massive growth for the practice.

Her passion is to share her success and knowledge with other practices so that they can experience a great team working environment while watching their profitably explode. What you will experience with coaching by Cindy, is somebody that can bring your team together to create your ultimate dental practice, and the ultimate patient experience.

It is through her years of experience in the dental field and the methodologies of Dental Practice Solutions that Cindy creates the next level of success for each dental practice she touches

When not focusing of dentistry, Cindy spend her time with her family exploring the outdoors in beautiful Pacific Northwest.

Contact Cindy: admin@dentalpracticesolutions.com

7 Ways to Eliminate Short-notice Cancellations and No-show Appointments

By: admin

June 3, 2013

For the past 3 years dentists have been calling my office to ask “Debbie, how can I stop all these last minute cancellations?!” and “Debbie, how can I stop the bleeding of my hygiene schedule? Look at all these holes in the schedule!”

The calls from more dentists continue and I continue to create more and more solutions for the new callers and the offices that still feel stuck and have not implemented any of the suggestions.

I am sorry to say but listening to be give solutions is not going to stop the cancellations and the bleeding. There will always be emergency situations in your patient’s lives that cause them to call and cancel. The situation is that will never be able to completely eliminate cancellations. This is a fact of life. What you can do is eliminate the cancellations and no-shows that occur because your patients do not consider their dental appointment important.

Today, I write about strategies to consider and eliminate or at least decrease your last-minute and/or no-show appointments down to a very low number week.

1. Identify patients with a history of last minute cancellations and no-shows. You need to create a different strategy to work with these patients.

2. Do not call and confirm patients appointments and then ask them to call back to verify they received your message. This will only invite them to call you back and cancel their appointment.

3. Do not allow patients to call and leave an appointment cancellation on your voicemail or answering service. Your message needs to state that your office doesn’t not accept cancellation messages. The only way a patient can cancel an appointment is to speak to someone live in your office.

4. When a patient is known for cancelling appointments short notice and/or no-showing for their appointments do not allow them to reschedule an appointment within a 2 week period. Do not allow these patients to think that your time is not valuable and they can return to your office quickly. These patients may need to be on a “short-notice” call list.

5. When you do call a patient to confirm an appointment, say phrases such as “Susan is looking forward to seeing you tomorrow at 2pm for your preventive care appointment. Please take your Amoxicillin one hour prior to your appointment and we will see you then.” That is all. Stop saying things like “This is Dr. Jones’s office calling to confirm your cleaning tomorrow at 2pm. Can you please call me back to let me know you have received this message?”

6. Stay connected with your patients in between their dental appointments. This can be done through an office newsletter, text messages and social media. I suggest that every office have an office Fan page. Communicate at least once a day when you are working at the office. If you have a special running or contest post this on your fan page. Let patients know you have the fan page and give them a chance to “Like” your page while they are in your office. Many offices today have an iPad in the treatment rooms and/or reception area which can assist your patients with writing a review and “liking” your page while they are in your office.

7. WIIFM syndrome. It seems to be typical these days for people to be motivated to do something because there is something in it for them. Offices seem to have a decrease in short-notice cancellations and no-shows when they offer free whitening touch-ups to their hygiene patients. Patients are rewarded for continually showing up for their dental appointments. When patients do not cancel short-notice or no-show they qualify to receive 2 syringes of whitening for free. 1 syringe 2 times a year. Forever White™ is the same premium ingredients but for about 60% less money. The syringes are individually packaged and the size of each syringe is 25% larger than most whitening product syringes.

CONCLUSION

There are numerous ways you can reduce those short-notice cancellations and eliminate the constant no-shows. The most important thing you can do is to choose one of these 7 tips and implement at least 1 of these today. Meet with your team and set some goals to implement more of these suggestions. Monitor your success and remember to celebrate your successes.

Consider utilizing Forever White™ today. You will receive our eBook to Boosts Profits, all the team support to get your patients enrolled in this program and so much more, with your first order.

Debbie Seidel- Bittke, RDH, BS is founder of Dental Practice Solutions. Debbie has immersed herself in the science, systems, services and methodologies that create success and profitability in a dental practice, beginning with increasing the bottom line in the dental hygiene department. She writes for numerous dental journals, speaks at dental conferences nationally and for seven years in a row, she has been known as one of Dentistry Today’s Top Consultants.

Forever White™ : How to Keep Patients Coming Back!

By: admin

January 4, 2013

I recently spoke at a dental conference and asked the audience “What is one thing that your patients want more than any other procedure?” 100% of the attendees answered in harmony “WHITER TEETH!”

You may be offering patients something they never knew they really wanted so here is how to open up the conversation.

Step One
While patients are seated in the treatment room and as you are reviewing the patient medical history, ask a few simple questions. One of the questions can be something such as: “Mrs. Jones, if there is one thing you could change about your smile, what would that be?” Wait for her to answer. This is not a yes or no answer but allow the patient to think of their own answer. It must be answer that doesn’t require a “yes” or “no” but their honest opinion about their teeth. Most of us have at least one thing we would like to change about our smile or how we can look better! We are our own best and worst critic!

Another question you may want to ask is “Mr. Holmes, If I could wave a magic wand and create any wish about your teeth or smile, what would you wish for?” Now that can be a powerful question, as well as get a smile from most people you ask this question!

Asking one of these two questions or developing your own simple questions about how a patient would like to change their smile, can open the door for more cosmetic procedures. Most will want teeth whitening, Invisalign®, Six-Month Smiles®, Veneers, Ortho or even implants. Give it a try for the next month and keep account of the additional services that can come out of your dental hygiene appointments and of course new patient appointments!

Ask a few simple questions to your patients about their smile and you will create a consistent profit stream to your dental practice.

Changing Lives One Smile at a Time
As a dental professional you and your team are changing lives. You are able to truly change the way people feel every day about themselves.

“White teeth is one of the first things people notice about a persons appearance. You have the valuable expertise to not only change how long and healthy your patients live but also how beautiful their smile is. A smile can affect their day to day life in a positive way!”

Men and women of all ages throughout the world are now opting for teeth whitening to improve their smile.

Many patients today are still clueless about the variety of various products and this is why it is very important to educate your patients on the variety of whitening products and procedures you have available to patients in your office.

Keep Them Coming Back for More
For several years, dental offices have seen a decline in New Patient numbers. I see advertisements through social living sites and Google Ads; dentists are spending thousands of dollars in advertising for new patients.

I would never say not to advertise to increase New Patient numbers, but I know there are two ways to get production numbers up as well as New Patient numbers.

If you advertise for New Patients, I suggest that you include teeth whitening in the New Patient fee. (YES! At no charge) You can easily and cost-effectively offer free whitening in your dental office and every six months when the patient returns offer them a free whitening syringe. There is a simple way to deliver this without losing money but gaining patient loyalty and also referrals from your patients. You will gain more attention with your ad if you include the whitening in the New Patient appointment.

The thought here is “give patients something they really want” and use whitening as an incentive for keeping their regularly scheduled hygiene appointments.

There are many patient loyalty programs available to dental practices but they have a hefty monthly fee to participate. Forever White™ is a Premium Patient Incentive Program that has no monthly enrollment fee for the dental practice. Forever White™ is a system for dentists to use and create other income streams.

Forever White™ is a premium patient incentive program dentists can market and brand as their own. View it as a private label program that the dentist can offer their patients, that they can’t get just anywhere. The office will be using the same quality premium whitening gel but at half the price. This means the dentist keeps their patients and more money stays in the dental practice.
It also can used to reactivate those overdue patients and helps to gain patient loyalty. A series of calls and letters are sent to the patients explaining the premium whitening program. The best part of this type of program is that whitening only costs the dentist a few dollars (Pounds, EURO) to use because of the special pricing offered to dentists worldwide.

Why Does This Concept Work Well?
One of the reasons this concept works so well is because patients feel like a VIP when they are given the special treatment. Patients will respond kindly when you give them what they want. People feel much better about themselves when they see a beautiful smile. This is what will give you a competitive edge over other dental offices down the street or even a few miles away.

This is also a fantastic tool to get a “YES!” from patients to continue with further restorative needs. The whitening is only the tip of the iceberg.
Not only do your patients have a reason to smile, they have a great reason to continue returning to your office and you will also smile when your bank account grows over your 2012 balance!

Need more information about how to order? Send us an email: support@dentalpracticesolutions.com or call us: 503-970-1122

Toll-free: 888-816-1511

Please note:

* There is no monthly membership charge. You are only charged the wholesale price for the whitening gel. We provide the materials at no additional cost to you so you can reactivate, retrain your patients why their hygiene appointment is so important and your will retain your patients for life! We coach and guide you to utilize whitening most successfully.

Our product has a 100% guarantee! If you are not satisfied send it back. We’ll return your money paid for the product. That is how confident we are you will love Forever White™!