Building a reliable team of administrative staff for your practice, whether it’s patient coordinators, insurance specialists, or even just front desk receptionists, can be difficult and expensive to do. Not only do you have to offer them decent benefits to stay competitive with other practices, but you need to teach them the ropes of your practice’s scheduling software and charting methods, which only takes up valuable time. For these reasons and more, it may be more appropriate to choose a dental answering service for all of your admin needs! Here are five reasons why.

When you and your staff are out to lunch, so are new potential patients. They call your office trying to set up an appointment, but instead they get an answering machine. They hang up and try calling the next practice on the list. You just lost an opportunity to make money. This is the exact situation, among others like it, that we at Dental Support Specialties can prevent through our dental answering service. With us, you don’t have to worry about patients falling through the cracks. In this post, learn what we can do for you to make sure that you get every chance possible with your potential patients.

Dad’s Life Lesson

Growing up in Fremont Ohio, my dad instilled something in my four sisters and I so strongly, it’s still with us every single day. His golden rule of “if you aren’t early, you’re late!” was to him a key life lesson. (And by early, he meant by at least ½ hour!)

First, I Worked Front Desk

When I was pregnant with my fourth daughter, Alison, I worked front desk at a dental practice. My husband, Joey, was a high school biology teacher and football coach, who had just started two-a-days training. I was one busy mama. But at the time I never dreamed of remote work for my dentist’s office.

During a consultation, you take time to get to know each patient, understand their needs, and create a personalized treatment plan to achieve their smile goals. But what if they leave your office before scheduling their treatment? After a while, they may forget about doing the treatment at all, meaning that you lost that opportunity for more business. Similarly, cancellations can leave spots open in your schedule. How can you make up for these situations and get these patients through your door? You can have your team follow up with these patients, or you can turn to Dental Support Specialties to help with your dental scheduling. Here are three reasons to take this important step so that these patients don’t fall through the cracks.

When you finished dental school, you probably thought your days of feeling confused and overwhelmed were finally over. Then, in private practice, you found the world of dental insurance, a common source of frustration for both dental practices and patients alike. You want your team to run like a well-oiled machine, but they can get bogged down by the insurance hoops they’re forced to jump through. If you and your team don’t have the experience, knowledge, and tools to deal with companies for dental insurance verification and collection, you could be losing money. In this post, learn how you can take advantage of Dental Support Specialties’ billing support services and maximize your profits.

As a dental practice, your goal is not only to provide the best dental care possible. It’s also to make patients feel welcome when they arrive and prepared once they come back. It’s about making them feel comfortable during every step of their dental appointment. This should include the initial contact to your practice, especially if it’s over the phone. The last thing they should hear is an answering machine with no one to help them.

With the help of a dental answering service, you can take the hassle out of scheduling while still ensuring that your new and existing patients are getting the service they deserve.

When you’re running around the office serving patients, the last thing on your mind is taking a look at the data your practice has already collected. However, chart auditing is one of the most commonly overlooked tasks in the dental office, and yet it has some of the most potential when it comes to maximizing your profits.

It’s important to keep in mind that dental answering services are not only focused on answering the phone when you’re not available. Learn how a thorough chart auditing and patient reactivation program can help get your current patients in the practice more consistently!

Whether you need help answering the phone or working through insurance claims, managing the ins and outs of your dental practice can be incredibly difficult without the right team. It doesn’t matter if you’re a general dentist, periodontist, prosthodontist, orthodontist, or oral surgeon, a dental answering service can help you manage your administrative workload. At the end of the day, improving your practice’s profitability and giving you the time needed to focus on patients are the two highest priorities to meet.

If you’ve been considering a dental answering service in order to reduce administrative duties at your practice, you’ll want to make sure that you’re getting the best bang for your buck. Just because they take calls from patients on your behalf doesn’t mean they aren’t able to improve other aspects of your practice as well.

Those who already work with a dental answering service will want to ask themselves if their company already performs these four functions. If you don’t work with an answering service, there’s no better time than now to speak with one today!