Tips Courtesy of Shoberg Dental Consulting - Elev8ing Dental Practices

As dental offices close or reduce hours, and guidelines recommend all but emergency dental procedures be suspended for several weeks, this is a time of uncertainty and concern for many people. However, it's important during times like these to focus on the positive. 

There is ALWAYS something to be done in a dental office, even if there are no patients on the schedule. Here are some ways that you can show your team that you care about them and their ability to provide for their families and, at the same time, set your practice up for success when we all get back to some kind of normalcy.

• Work your collections/AR. Focus first on insurance receivables. Remember that patients may be unable to pay their balances right now and we want to be sensitive to obstacles...but screening for credit pre-approvals and let patients know they have options for paying their balances.
• Catch up on your re-care and unscheduled treatment reports. Call patients and get them on the schedule for 1-2 months out to ensure healthy schedules when you return to business.
• Develop a payment plan policy for patients financially affected by this crisis. They may be unable to think about getting dental work done if they are behind on mortgage, rent, utilities, etc. Show them that you care and are thinking of ways to help them.
• Were you considering changing or updating software? Now may be the time to do it without disrupting operations and avoid training concerns.
• Update employee manuals, OSHA/HIPAA policies.
• Update insurance policy info in your software. We all know how time consuming it is to get full benefit breakdowns from insurance companies. Now would be a perfect time to get those things in order to hit the ground running and reduce future estimating errors.

These things are NOT busy work. They will help your team manage patients and can help boost production and collections in the long run.

Tips courtesy of Shoberg Dental Consulting - Elev8ing Dental Practices.

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