Over the last couple of weeks, practices and businesses have temporarily closed their doors because of the threat of COVID-19. However, unlike many stores or offices, your practice needs to still be available to help with dental emergencies. That means you must remain accessible to your patients for dental scheduling even though your team isn’t in the office. Fortunately, Dental Support Specialties is already set up to help your practice remotely, protecting everyone involved and allowing everyone to stay safe during these uncertain times.

Managing your patient dental benefits on all levels is crucial to keeping your cash flow moving. Being proactive in managing your patient dental benefits is just as important! (think obtaining patient benefits and clean claim submissions!)

What are some of the front desk and scheduling precautions you will be taking in your office?

Here are some that we are seeing: (follow your state, county and health department guidelines)

• Limited if any seating in the reception area and no family members allowed to wait (unless they are waiting in their car)
• Having patients call or text your office from the parking lot upon arrival – Do as MUCH check in and check out as you can via the phone including treatment/financial consults, payments and scheduling. Have staff member fully protected with appropriate PPE meet patient at their car to take temperature and to ask health screening questions.
• Keep office door locked – no walk in patients. Appointment only. Have a sign on your entrance displaying this.
• COVID prescreening appointment calls. ASK the questions. DOCUMENT the answers.

We at Dental Support Specialties hope you and your families have been staying safe and healthy! What a crazy time this has been. With all the uncertainty that lies before us, one thing we can control is our actions. Our responses. Our proactivity. Our plans for reopening and what our new normal might look like. Being prepared to accommodate appointments and patient needs and having solid plans ready for immediate execution.

Be Prepared. The time is now to start preparing for your reopening on all levels.

You can view and print out the Presidents Guidelines for opening up here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/03.16.20_coronavirus-guidance_8.5x11_315PM.pdf

In an ideal world, patients would pay for their dental treatment completely out of pocket without needing dental insurance, but we don’t live in an ideal world. In fact, for many practices, dental insurance is almost considered a necessary evil, a way that patients are able to afford basic services. Although this payment method adds several steps to the process, did you know that dental insurance doesn’t have to be such a hassle for you and your team? Read on to learn how you can get dental insurance support for your practice.

You’ve been practicing dentistry for many years now. Over that time, you’ve undergone countless hours of training, dealt with a myriad of different scenarios, and served thousands of patients. In other words, in your practice, experience matters. At Dental Support Specialties, we couldn’t agree more—experience in the dentistry field is priceless, especially when it comes to serving patients.

With 30 people on our team, we have approximately 400 years of total experience. That’s 400 years at your practice’s disposal to act as your dental answering service, schedule appointments, perform dental insurance verification, and represent your practice.