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What happens if the office manager goes on vacation, the hygienist calls in sick, or the dental assistant runs off with prince charming? Missing a team member for even one day can lead to chaos in a dental office. Team members feel overwhelmed, which could ultimately lead to a decline in the quality of patient care. It doesn’t have to be this way. The Office Manager I had a wonderful office manager early in my career who worked with me, or more accurately, put up with me, for nearly fifteen years. I hired her within a year of graduating [...]

The list is long and unfortunately distinguished. Don’t get me wrong, most of the time we don’t like dealing with dental insurance plans and their reps either. But we are the only major consulting company that teaches dentists and their teams to keep them, because we know and teach how to be profitable with them. Please allow me to tell each of you who these teachers of “dump dental plans” really are: 1. They are individuals who have likely never read a PPO contract, cover to cover, in their entire lives. That would require a lot of effort and investigative [...]

Years ago, I wrote an article on direct operating costs, and how important they are when setting your fee-for-service fees - let alone evaluating your profitability with contracted insurance reimbursement fees. And we all know how most dentists simply hate to use the term “profits” when discussing their businesses. But the simple fact is this: Dentists and their teams often cannot grasp the concept that the patient is responsible to pay for more expensive products and services, whether insured or not. This is a simple and “insurance verifiable” concept we’ve taught at My Practice My Business for years, yet [...]

I had a great conversation with one of my respected and trusted colleagues (and friend) several weeks ago. The conversation was not an unusual one, as I have had this conversation with many of you who have been through some sort of consulting with various consulting groups out there. The simple question is this: Should you submit your fee-for-service fees or your contracted fees to the PPO companies you work with? It’s a very simple answer when you talk with accountants, a “no brainer” when you talk with forensic accounting investigators, and it’s a “power struggle” when you listen to dental [...]

It was July of 2017 when a 43-year-old male patient came to my office complaining of pain in #27. Much to my surprise he was missing all lower molars and bicuspids, with an RPD anchoring on both mandibular canines. He also had a full maxillary denture that flopped around like a fish out of water. The remaining lower mandibular teeth, 22 through 27, were not in the best condition and would need removal. Sounds like the typical story “my hygiene was never the greatest," right? After further examination, it was obvious his alveolar ridges were atrophied, resorbed, nearly non-existent, and [...]

For years I’ve given this topic a lot of thought. It’s a subject that, not until now, I had any answer to. First, let’s define the word “dichotomy”. di·chot·o·my /dīˈkädəmē/ noun: a division or contrast between two things that are or are represented as being opposed or entirely different. synonyms: contrast, difference, polarity, conflict;  gulf, chasm, division, separation, split; "the great dichotomy between theory and practice" Now let’s discuss the typical background of the dental office personnel: The Doctor: This person has typically gone through four years of undergraduate school, and four years of doctoral training at an accredited dental school. Very few dentists have received any [...]

Each year in January many dental practices adjust their Fee-for-Service (FFS) fee schedule to help cover rising expenses in their dental business, and to hopefully generate higher profit margins. There have been many approaches throughout the years I have seen dental practices use to determine these new fees: There is the “across the board” approach where practices increase fees between 3% and 7% for all services. This works great if your practice is predominantly a fee-for-service practice. But if your practice is PPO insurance driven, this approach really doesn’t work that well because it doesn’t increase revenues from work done on [...]

In the State of Utah our Dental Association puts out a publication every two months called the UDA Action. In the January February 2019 publication Dr. Chamberlain, our UDA President, shared some fantastic stats on dentistry here in Utah. If you live in another state, listening to this podcast, you might want to take note on my comments to this article, as it may have some cross-over where you practice. Last September, Marco Vujicic, an economist and head of the ADA’s Health Policy Institute (HPI), came to the Roseman Dental School, located in South Jordan, Utah, and presented information to the [...]

Oh my, where do I even begin? Many years ago, I lectured on digital imaging and radiography. Trying to help practices understand the benefits of this technology was difficult back then, and now it’s the norm for most practices. However, how many offices still use analog radiographs today? With the constant changes in dental technology, it’s not healthy to embrace the status quo. Most of you have heard the phrase, “change or die”. We hear that phrase in business classes or seminars, yet I don’t think that is entirely correct. There are many techniques and materials I learned about in [...]

I’m finally getting around to looking at my first quarter results in my dental practice. Sound familiar? I was shocked to see our profits were down. How could this be? The number of patients seen and procedures worked were both up. But, profits were down for the first time in years. It was time to dig a little deeper and learn why. We discovered several things that have changed incrementally over the last several years: Several of the major insurance players have been decreasing reimbursements on our primary procedures by a few dollars each year. Our lab fees have increased [...]