Dental Practice Management

Not knowing how to run an effective staff meeting can have some negative consequences in the overall health of your dental practice. We’ve found that many offices don’t have meetings at all. When they do, we often find that nobody gets anything out of them since poorly organized staff meetings can easily turn into gripe sessions that waste everyone’s time. Staff meetings, or team huddles, should be useful and routine, not organized as emergencies because someone is upset or a team member has made a mistake. Calling a meeting for these reasons is usually ineffective and can actually be damaging. Staff meetings that aren’t...

1. Time is money It is the small things that add up to consuming vast amounts of time, and as we all know: Time is money. Too often, staff members look busy but are in fact simply handling unnecessary work they needlessly generate caused by inefficiencies, lack of training, and so on. Some examples that generate unnecessary work are listed below: Lab case is not in the office when the patient arrives.A message is taken but not given to the correct person.A patient leaves the office without an appointment.   The patient's phone number is incorrect.There is incomplete information in charts.Incomplete...

IMPORTANT   Some states allow you to thank a referring patient after the fact of the referral with a nominal gift ($10.00 - $25.00) however, the referring patient cannot have an expectation of the reward.  A personally signed thank you card or note, ideally from the doctor, is smart and good manners. You can offer a credit to new patients. The amount can be $50.00 or $100.00 or more. You can also offer a free cleaning or exam or nothing at all. It’s totally up to you but, most find a dollar value works best.   If you offer a dollar amount still submit your usual...