economy

Some Dentists Fire Patients After Missed Appointments

January 10, 2012 By Catherine Hughes 1 Comment

Some Dentists Fire Patients After Appointment No-Shows 36% of dentists don’t charge for missed dental appointments — no matter how many times a patient is a “no-show.”

Only 5% charge a fee for the first offense, while 39% charge a fee after the second missed appointment. 20% of dentists charge after the 3rd missed appointment.

With the current economic conditions, The Wealthy Dentist decided to ask dentists if they have been charging for missed appointments.

Boston’s Pilgrim Hospital is in the news this week for reveling that in the first 10 months of 2011 patients failed to attend almost 17,000 appointments. Thats about 49 missed medical appointments for every day of the year.

“Time is money!” complained one dentist, and he is right. A missed appointment is an appointment that can be filled by other patients. Missed appointment fees ranged from $25.00 for the first no-show to $2,500.00 after the third missed appointment. The average fee is $75.00.

The following dentist’s comments were selected to share how dentists are handling missed appointments –

Pre-paying is popular …

“We ask the patient to pre-pay for future appointments.” (Illinois dentist)

“Repeat offenders are put on ‘probation’ where they must pre-pay (the full price, non-refundable) before we will schedule them again. This way we don’t ‘fire’ them, they either pre-pay or leave the practice. They are usually on ‘probation’ until they consistently show up.” (Kentucky dentist)

“We have them pay before the appointment and if they break the appointment, the fee is deducted from their account.” (Missouri dentist)

“After three missed appts we will not reschedule unless they prepay in full for whatever the appointment is for. It works great. We have a great practice and people know the value that they receive here.” (Colorado dentist)

“We ask the patients who no show for 2 appts or more to prepay for further visits.” (General dentist)

“We just charge them little more when they come next. Also if they are entitled for any offers or discounts don’t give them that.” (General dentist)

Confirming helps …

“Confirm. Confirm. Confirm.” (General dentist)

“Have your patients give you the cell number where they receive texts and text them their appointment. Works like a charm.” (California dentist)

“We confirm by phone, email and text message.” (General dentist)

“We double book or call patient the morning of appointment.” (California dentist)

“We send a sms reminder the day before the scheduled appointment.” (General dentist)

Same day or on-call appointments only …

“After the second time we choose the option of putting the patient on our short call list only.” (Georgia dentist)

“We don’t give 3rd time offenders the opportunity to schedule in advance. We put them in our ‘Short Notice Club’ and call them when we have an opening or they can call to see if they can get in that day.” (Oklahoma dentist)

“After 3 missed, the patient must call on a day they would like to come in and see if there is an appointment available.” (Pennsylvania dentist)

“We don’t “fire” them but put them on a VIP list where we call them when we have a same day appointment available.” (New Hampshire dentist)

Fire them …

“My letter to the patient who I am dismissing is actually very nice. It states that our priorities do not match and that they would be better served by another dentist and to please let us know where to forward their records. A lot of times, the patient begs us to let them come back to the practice and they become our best patients ever about being there for their appointments even in bad weather, etc.!” (Alabama dentist)

“We send three letters and then dismiss patient with a 30 day emergency window so they have ample time to find a new dentist that will be more conducive to their schedule.” (Missouri dentist)

“You must get rid of them because you can not afford them. The other thought is to give them a stand-by appt. They may have to wait a while to be seen.” (North Carolina dentist)

“After a new patient reschedules/misses an appointment twice, we fire/do not reschedule. When existing patients break numerous appointments we notify them to call us on a day when they have extra /free time on their schedule and we will see if we can work them in at that time (this way we are not blocking an actual appointment for them). The best approach would be to require a credit card at time of scheduling to hold the appointment.” (General dentist)

How do you handle missed appointments? Have you ever “fired” a patient?

Filed Under: Dental Surveys, The Wealthy Dentist Tagged With: dental fees, dental practice, dental practice management, dentist, dentistry, dentists, economy, missed appointment, missed appointments

Dental Marketing: Powerful Reasons for Offering Daily Dental Deals

January 3, 2012 By Jim Du Molin 3 Comments

Dental insurance may be one way to attract new dental patients, but a new dental marketing player has emerged in 2011: daily deal offers.

According to Dan Hess, CEO and founder of Local Offer Network, approximately 9% of all offers on daily deal websites in November 2011 were for dental work or some form of medical treatment, up from 4.5% in the beginning of 2011.

USA Today reports that approximately one out of every 11 deals offered online is for a health care service, according to data compiled by DealRadar.com, a site that gathers and lists 20,000 deals a day from different websites.

Dental deals are the most popular among users of daily deal websites.

Many attribute the growth of the use of daily deals in the healthcare sector with sites like Groupon, is the fact that 45 million Americans under 65 have no dental insurance coverage, and another 46 million have no health insurance coverage, according to CDC statistics. The daily discount deals offer many uninsured Americans a way to visit the dentist or doctor.

Some argue that a one-time visit to the dentist because of a deal coupon does not create a lasting dentist-patient relationship, or attract the right type of dental patient. Good long term dental marketing studies are hard to come by in dentistry.

However, the economic potential can be great.

The owners of Robust might agree. Robust is a wine bar and cafe in St. Louis, Missouri that ran a Groupon deal for $18.00 and sold 4200 deals for a potential $75,000 in revenue to be shared with Groupon. As important as the revenue was to Robust, their Groupon deal gained national news attention with tons of free marketing for their business that they never would have been able to afford.

Dr. Gregg Feinerman, an ophthalmologist who runs Feinerman Vision Center in Newport Beach, Calif told USA Today about his experience with Groupon, “We reached a whole new demographic who otherwise wouldn’t find us.” He offered a 58% discount on Lasik eye surgery. “It’s a better way to market,” he said.

He used Groupon as a way to bring in patients under 30-years-old with the hope that they would recommend his services to friends and rate him on review website Yelp. A good review might persuade someone else to visit his office, Feinerman said. He charges $5,000 for the surgery on both eyes; a price that he said can be “overwhelming for 20-to 30-year-olds.”

Is this brilliant marketing or just clever pricing?

Feinerman approached Groupon about listing the eye surgery for $3,000. Groupon, which is based in Chicago, pushed him to lower the price to $2,100. Dr. Feinerman got exactly the type of patient he was looking for in Thomas Cho. Cho, 29, bought the offer and after the surgery wrote a review on Yelp. He gave the vision center five stars — the highest rating on the website.

Cho said in an interview that his health insurance plan only covers 20% of the regular price of Lasik since it is considered a cosmetic procedure. He would have paid about $4,000 if he had used his insurance discount. Cho decided to buy the Groupon, paying $2,100 initially. After consulting with the doctor, he upgraded his surgery to an all-laser procedure for $1,000 more. At the time, Cho’s credit card issuer was offering a 20% cash back promotion on Groupon purchases. In all, he saved more than $1,300.

We have written extensively on Google Offers and Groupon ad design and strategy. Now it is time to hear back from you as to both the short and long term results of the new dental marketing vector!

For more on the USAToday story see: Uninsured turn to daily deal sites for health care.

Filed Under: The Wealthy Dentist Tagged With: daily deals, dental marketing, dentist, dentistry, economy, Google offers, Groupon, Internet dental marketing, marketing

Dentists Looking to 2012 for an Economic Upswing

December 27, 2011 By Jim Du Molin 2 Comments

Recent economic reports give U.S. economists hope that 2012 will be an improvement over 2011, and it seems there are many dentists who agree.

“If the economy improves, as it should, we all should do better in 2012!” said one dentist.

In fact, when asked what they expect for 2012, 77% of the dentists who responded to our survey anticipate a better financial picture, while only 23% expect 2012 to be a bad year.

When asked about the past two years, 42% of the dentists said 2011 was economically better than 2010. However, for 40% of dentists, 2011 was economically worse than 2010. 18% saw no difference economically between 2010 and 2011.

Here are some dentist comments:

Dental marketing worked…

“We plan that each year will improve over previous year due to addition of an associate and definitive marketing strategies utilizing the Internet Dental Alliance web sites!” (Oklahoma dentist)

“We didn’t have a better year by mistake. It was due to being proactive and using targeted dental marketing.” (California dentist)

“We streamlined our dental marketing efforts, increased our marketing return on investment, focused more on internal marketing, and tightened our belts on our overall office expenditures. We will end this year with more new patients and economically much better than the previous 3 years. We are riding out the economic storm fairly well.” (Ohio prosthodontist)

“I feel our picture is 50% real and 50% what’s in our head. If we stay positive and use services like yours we can make our results better than average. How much better depends on our head and the help we get.” (Urgent care dentist)

Implementing new strategies helped …

“We are staying afloat because we offer a very wide-range of services for a General Dentist – Invisalign, Sedation, Implant placement and restoration, CEREC, most Endo, Perio, and Oral Surgery. Without this broad offering, we would be doing much worse.” (General dentist)

“We are down 5% but we completely remodeled our office doubling our space, had 5 of 8 staff members pregnant, losing 4 of them, worked through the construction dust and noise, and were still only down 5%, so I am happy with 5% downturn. I look forward to 2012.” (California dentist)

“In order to turn things around, I have completely had to change my practice. I have a management group I am now using and am revamping office systems. We are working hard to maintain the high level of care we have always offered, but am now participating as “in network” with dental insurance, and am now thinking about profit centers and time management. We are trying for a balance that doesn’t diminish our ability to do awesome dentistry, but it will be more difficult with the restrictions that insurance companies place on treatment. Illinois has been hit hard by the economy, with the “reported” unemployment level finally getting down under 11% for the 1st time in 3 years in December with the seasonal Christmas hirings. The actual unemployment is around 21%.” (Illinois dentist)

“I spent time creating additional avenues of wealth.” (General dentist)

“I will continue as I have through thick and thin, modifying as I see necessary, continuing to update skills, and taking very good care of my patients. While this year was a downturn, compared to many of my local peers, it was truly a minor one.” (South Carolina dentist)

“I am dropping Delta Premier. I tried it this year and I can’t give that 25-35 percent discount.” (Illinois dentist)

Looking to 2012 for relief …

“Our goal is to increase by 30% in 2012.” (New Jersey dentist)

“The first half of 2011 was the best ever. The second half saw a decrease relative to 2010. The trend is for 2012 to be flat, so I am playing it very conservative right now.” (Virginia dentist)

“They must improve in 2012!” (General dentist)

“In 2012 I definitely need to change how I do business in regards to PPOs. I use to be an all fee-for-service practice. That dwindled, and now I am busy, but not profitable. (California dentist)

“If President Obama loses we’ll see a much better economy.” (General dentist)

The Wealthy Dentist would like to thank all the doctors and specialists who have participated in our dental surveys over the past year. We find your insights and comments invaluable and we appreciate the time you take to offer feedback.

We wish all of you a very prosperous 2012!

Filed Under: Dental Surveys, The Wealthy Dentist Tagged With: dental marketing, dental marketing surveys, dental practice marketing, dental surveys, dentistry, economy, Internet dental marketing, survey

Dental Insurance Determines Who Will See a Dentist

December 19, 2011 By Catherine Hughes 2 Comments

Dental Insurance Determines Who Will See a Dentist Dental insurance status is a major determinant of who will seek dental treatment, according to a Facts and Findings report by Rutgers’ Center for State Health Policy.

The report complied data from the CSHP’s 2001 and 2009 New Jersey Family Health surveys on children ages 3 to 18 who received no dental services within a year.

The study found that children with employer-sponsored or privately purchased dental insurance were much more likely to receive dental care than children without dental insurance or even those covered by publicly insured programs like by Medicaid/NJ Family Care.

According to Rudgers University news, the report also pointed to well-care doctor visits as an important indicator of the likelihood of a child receiving dental care, possibly because of efforts to increase dental referrals in managed care plans and the expansion of dental care in federally qualified health centers.

“The odds were three times as great for children who did not have a well-child doctor visit in the past year to not receive dental care as those who visited a doctor,” said José Nova, research project coordinator and lead author of the study. He noted that care for under-served children could be improved with expanded health coverage under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Reuters estimates that 45 million Americans do not have dental insurance.

Filed Under: Dental Editorials Tagged With: dental insurance, dental insurance plans, dentist, dentistry, dentists, economy, insurance

Dentists: Are Dental Hygienists Worth Their Weight in Gold?(video)

November 14, 2011 By Catherine Hughes Leave a Comment

Dentists: Are Dental Hygienists Worth Their Weight in Gold?(video) In our story, Dental Hygienists Among the Fastest Growing Occupations in the U.S. we revealed that the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook for 2008-2018 expects the demand to hire more hygienists to perform preventive dental care will continue to grow.

According to the ADA, independent dentists reported paying full-time dental hygienists $33.90 per hour in 2008.

Considering the current economic environment The Wealthy Dentist decided to conduct a survey asking dentists if they pay their hygienists an hourly wage or if compensation is based on commission.

It seems most dentists still pay their dental hygienists an hourly wage, but some feel paying on commission is more fair. Said one dentist, “Hygienists are worth their weight in gold!” Another dentist disagreed saying, “Practices couldn’t run without them, but the current economics barely breaks even at best … hygienists seem to think they are cash cows for the office and fail to recognize the support and facilities the utilize.”

It’s an interesting economic issue. Click on Play to hear more of what dentists say about paying hygienists –

How do you pay the hygienist in your practice?