In an article located in the jada.ada.org database written in 2005, Albert H. Guay, D.M.D., wrote a paper concerning the dental market price, production, and profit increases in relation to the rest of the nations various markets and industries. His
research and findings are interesting. His article “explores the relationship of dental fee increases, physicians’ fee increases and overall price increases. The author uses the applicable consumer price indexes (CPIs) for the past 30 years to determine whether any similarities in behaviors exist. The relationship between office operating costs, production and net income also are explored.”

The article came to the following conclusion, “Dental practices have been able to respond to changes in the overall national economy in a timely manner. Adjustments in the fees dentists have charged have been parallel to changes in the overall costs of goods and services in the nation. Dentists’ incomes have increased steadily, as have the costs of operating a dental practice. The most significant means dentists have used to maintain growth of their net incomes has been to expand dental office production.”

This has worked in the past, but will Dentists’ continue to be able to sustain growth each year through advances in dental office production? I think that they will, but it’s going to have to be through the web services. Web services meaning more
than just having a website. It’s having a website that “interacts” with your patients and future patients. If Dentists’ are to continue to expand their dental office production, they are going to need more effective and less expensive routes of communication and productivity. Web services will give them those things.

PatientDocs.com provides you with many web service tools for your practice. You are given a web-based software that helps you track communications with your patients. Things like Appointment Reminders or Birthday Reminders. PatientDocs.com gives you tools that allow your patients to fill out their New Patient Registration Forms online before they come into the office. With your existing clients, PatientDocs.com builds you tools that allows appointment requests. All of these things make your dental office more productive and less expensive to run at the same time. Thus, creating more and more profits and production for your practice. Then you can spend your time and effort on what really counts, that is giving your patients the service they deserve. Contact PatientDocs.com today by clicking here to find out more about their web services and how they can help your practice.

Another article written by Roger Levin,D.D.S from the article repository on jada.ada.org. This is an article concerning dental practice management and clinical excellence and how they actually work together. Roger is speaking to many dental practices who’s major concern are their patients and providing them with the best service possible. Many dentist’s shy away from focusing on practice management because they feel it detracts from their focus on quality of patient care. This article disproves the fact that it detracts a dentist’s focus. In fact, Roger Levin makes it very clear how they both work together.

Roger says “A practice that is disorganized or chaotic, for example, does not provide proper focus on the patient. A dentist who is constantly interrupted to solve managerial problems or “put out fires” is distracted from providing clinical excellence and cannot completely concentrate on patient care. Inefficiencies in a practice will lead to scheduling confusion, which often causes chaos, rushing and frustration for the doctor and patient.”

He continues by adding “Practices that lack a sufficient profit margin will be unable to invest in new technologies, invest in continuing education or use the best products and materials. Dental practices, like hospitals, are faced with the ever-increasing cost of technology. The addition of items such as practice management software and digital radiography systems require that certain levels of cash flow and profitability be maintained to afford a technology investment. In time, a practice that does not invest in new technologies, materials and services fails to offer its patients the highest level of care.”

Perhaps an interesting statistic he adds, “Inefficiencies in a practice are compounded by the fact that approximately 5 percent of patients are no-shows or last-minute cancellations each year. On a national level, close to 30 percent of patients are overdue for periodontal maintenance and oral cancer screenings. These numbers only illustrate further why practices must have systems in place to provide comprehensive diagnosis and treatment to all patients, as well as effective recare for overall excellence in oral health treatment.”

I agree with Roger Levin in the compounding effect dental practice management has on clinical excellence. It only helps! That’s why our services at PatientDocs.com are so important to every dental practice. We focus on better dentist to patient communication to help you provide the clinical excellence you need, all while managing your practice as a business better. This only reduces the stress all dentists are feeling and makes them more effective. Click Here to find out more about PatientDocs services and how they can help your dental practice.

An article posted in jada.ada.org entitled “Is The Internet Useful For Clinical Practice?“, several writers got together to write about the subject of Internet and how it is used in the dental industry. The article is basic and simply pulls information from a survey that was completed years ago. The numbers that were put together are striking. The authors sent a 25-question survey to 455 subscribers to the Internet Dental Forum. These subscribers we are talking about are of course dentists. The dentists were to respond to the survey either by email or by a specific web page. They had a 72 percent response rate on the survey. Of the 314 surveys they received, 98 percent of respondents used the internet at home, and 68 percent used the internet in their office. Only 5 percent used the internet in the treatment area.

The primary reason for these dentists using the internet was “to keep up in general, followed by to answer patient-specific questions and to provide patient education. Reduction of professional isolation was one of the most frequently cited advantages of using the Internet”. The article went on to say in conclusion, “The authors found that some dentists use the Internet to support clinical practice and that it helped dentists adopt new techniques for patient treatment and obtain information on new materials or products.”

A very interesting response came from this survey. A new and innovative way of thinking for dental practices nationwide has emerged. Using the internet as a way of “Patient Education” for your practice. It’s genius! Think about it! Every dental practice in America should have a website. And on that website there is a knowledge base for their patients. A knowledge base to answer questions and receive information continually that will help them. You can even take it a step further and send out a small portion of this knowledge base each month as an emailed newsletter. What a terrific way to educate your patient and achieve a higher level of customer service.

PatientDocs.com builds websites for the dental industry. We help you build a web presence that focuses on “Patient Education” to create this knowledge base that we are talking about. We get you setup with a custom website that has a “Patient Education” page where your patients can visit often and find answers to their questions. It’s a wonderful way to get connected on the web. By doing this you take better care of your existing patients and get more patients at the same time. Click Here to learn more about PatientDocs.com and the services we provide.

Collections are critical to any business model. They are just as critical to a dental practice. Chances are that if you have a hard time in collecting from your patients, you are probably having to either get out of business soon or borrow some money from a financial institution of some sort to make it another day. Roger levin, D.D.S., in his whitepaper on jada.ada.org titled “Collections and Financial Controls“, has given some interesting counsel in this particularly difficult area of our dental practices. He challenges dental practices to “collect at the time of service”, claiming that you basically have a better chance of receiving your dues at that time. It’s simple advice that could you save you thousands (or make you, depending on how you look at it) of dollars each year. The critical component to this however, is the service you provide. You must understand and feel that you are giving the best service possible as a Dentistry. In doing so, it’s easy to justify with yourself your demands for collecting “at the time of service”. Click Here to learn how PatientDocs.com can help you increase your levels of customer service to your patients without increasing office staff hours.

Roger Levin, D.D.S. states in his article that “Current studies indicate that approximately 60 percent of money overdue to a practice by more than 120 days will never be collected.” Do not let this happen to you. You should have such a good relationship with each and every patient that they want to pay you immediately. No more waiting 120 days for a payment. No more not receiving payments at all! Keep in constant communication with your patients when they are not in your office. Send birthday email reminders! Send smile reminders! Send appointment reminders! How about send a weekly or monthly newsletter to your patients, educating them on how to better take care of their teeth. Feel free to send a postcard now and then. Make it easier for them to setup another appointment with you by allowing them to fill out a form online rather than having to call you. All of these things will help your practice achieve better customer service and better collection results at the same time. PatientDocs.com can help you with all of those. Click Here to learn more about their services.

I recently read a wonderful article from The American Dental Association. It was entitled “Dental Business Management” written by Roger Levin, D.D.S. The purpose of the article was to provide helpful information to practicing dentists all over the United States on how to better run their practice as a “business”. He states that a “business is as much a science as is dentistry”. I could not agree with him more. The troubling fact that many dentists nationwide are dealing with is that their practices are a business.

The article gives several tips on increasing productivity and revenue in a dental practice. I wanted to highlight a few. In the Goals and Objectives portion of Roger Levin’s whitepaper, he challenges dentists to “Meet the needs of patients while producing $800,000 annually”, “achieve an 80 percent case-acceptance rate for all basic services”, “collect 98.5 percent of all monies owed to the practice within 60 days or less”, and “ensure that 25 percent of all practice production is performed by the hygiene department”. Very good and helpful information if you ask me.

In evaluating Roger Levin’s whitepaper, I couldn’t help but notice how helpful PatientDocs.com would be in accomplishing all 4 of the before mentioned goals and objectives. The Med eMails service would help in collecting 98.5 percent of all monies within 60 days or less because you are keeping in constant contact with your patients. Med eForms would help in producing an $800,000 annual income and being able to work less, due to the nature of more and more new clients coming to you from the web.

And last of all, you need to be able to educate your patients if you want to achieve an 80 percent case-acceptance rate for all basic services. What better way to educate your patients by having a well designed website with helpful resources and articles of information to educate them. PatientDocs.com creates a section of your website called the “Patient Education” section directly targeted to achieve this goal and objective. Click Here to learn more about PatientDocs.com and what they can do to help you with your dental practice!

The most obvious and proven method is Patient Interaction. Don’t confuse this with the deluge of marketing and promotions that other companies will employ to sell products or services. A Patient Interaction is a 1 to 1 communication that develops a relationship with the patient and helps the patient feel like their long term health and beauty are your first priority!

If you are like other Practitioners, you are concerned about the cost of maintaining that kind of relationship with your patients. It may take much of your valuable office resources to make phone calls, write letters, or make and send post cards that would potentially takes time away from the patients while they are actually in the office! As one Front Office Manager stated… “We can now email pre-procedure instructions to our patients, appointment reminders, and all of our patient forms for completions before the patient even comes into the office. The patients love being able to complete the forms at home and not have to fight kids while trying to manage a clipboard in the waiting room. It’s great!”.

Click Here and learn about our Med eMail service that will help save you time and help you keep better communication with all of your patients.

Have your forms ever run out of space for your patient to ENTER APPROPRIATE INFORMATION? Do you need a FORMS OVERHAUL? Are your forms COMPLIANT WITH STATE AND FEDERAL LAWS?

At PatientDocs, our Professional Form Designers will make your forms look and feel more professional than any form you’ve used before, allowing patients to fill out the forms automatically online with Validity Checks and Helfpful hints to guide them through the process. Your forms will be designed specifically to meet the needs of your office, your patients, as well as all State and Federal laws.

Your forms will be designed with your Practice logo and pertinent contact information and any other information that you request. If you’re not satisfied with the layout of the form, just let us know and we’ll redesign it for free until you are satisfied;

Not only will your forms be automated and put online, but you will receive a HIGH QUALITY PRINT VERSION to use for all your interoffice needs… And…Your forms are UPDATED FREE with your service whenever you need it. Check us out at www.patientdocs.com for more information regarding this service.

Has a patient ever had to ask you WHAT SOMETHING MEANS on your forms?

Has your office staff ever messed up an insurance claim because they didn’t understand what was on the form?

PatientDocs has made it possible not only to have your forms professionally redesigned for both print and digital formats, but we are able to place POP UP INFORMATION ON THE ONLINE FORMS that allows patients to have all their questions answered for each field on the form. Any information needed can be included, not as part of the form, but as a HELP SYSTEM TO THE PATIENT.

This technology also includes what are called VALIDITY CHECKS. We can design your forms to only allow appropriate information for each field. This reduces form errors, insurance claim problems, and other residual problems from erroneous information on forms. If this technology alone could SAVE YOU UP TO 10 HOURS EVERY MONTH in dealing with form errors, wouldn’t it be worth it? Click Here to learn more about Med eForms for your practices website.

Are patients excited when you hand them a clipboard and say “Please fill these out and sign these and BRING THEM BACK WHEN YOU’RE DONE and we’ll call you in when the doctor is ready.”…?

Do you schedule patients at least 20 to 30 minutes ahead because you know THEY WILL BE FILLING OUT FORMS first?

Have you ever had a mom or a dad in your office TRYING TO MANAGE CHILDREN while they have to fill out your office forms?

Your practice along with all the others obviously understand the importance of good time management. The better the management, THE MORE PATIENTS YOU CAN SEE. You will find that by having your office forms online and automated that you will be able to see up to 3 -5 more patients per week if only 1 out of every 10 patients used your forms online, or emailed.

The greatest benefit to having your forms available online is your PATIENTS NO LONGER WAIT in your waiting room. They fill out their forms at home and bring them in already filled out and ready to see the doctor. Click Here to learn more about this service for your dental or chiropractic practice.