Ask Sally

The mere fact that the Wand claims to provide painless injections would be a plus in the eyes of your patients. If I were you, I would want to experience this for myself firsthand. If it was a pleasant experience for me then I know it would be for my patients. Your question however was "can it help my practice". Giving painless injections is certainly something that patients should go out and tell their friends but remember it is important to have your systems in order and employees trained to provide the best in customer service in all aspects of your practice.

Our analyses of practices for over 26 years is done by business operational systems. Therefore, I would suggest that you breakdown teaching of these disciplines by system. There are over 20 business operational systems that run a practice. Those systems can be viewed by going to my web-site here: http://mckenziemgmt.com/cons-business.htm. Teaching them that systems run the operations and making informed decisions through facts rather than emotionally will set them on the path to success. You can also find educational books on my web-site as well as on-line training courses that may be used as supplements to your teachings.

Patients rely on the Internet for many uses, not the least of which is information and education. When they consider a purchase,when they are exploring a topic, when they want to know how to do something they turn to the Internet, and there are specific sites that they visit routinely. While you may not have a Web site and should consider developing one, in the interim you can begin providing patient education via e-mail. Send an e-mail newsletter to patients on a regular basis. It doesn’t need to be elaborate with time consuming designs. In fact, patients prefer fast to flashy. But send it periodically and use it to educate your patients on one or two dental topics that you can touch on in a couple of short paragraphs.

As exciting and promising as new dental technology is, before opening the checkbook or whipping out the credit card, practices need a technology plan and a budget in place. Without a plan it is easy to be seduced by the latest model of this and the greatest model of that only to end up with a mishmash of excellent equipment that is, together, an inefficient jumble of circuitry and microprocessors. Often dentists are so enamored by the specific features of a particular piece of equipment they don’t consider how well or even if that new item will work with their current platform. The end result is more team frustration and more practice inefficiency.

If your practice schedules patients when they are due, which I recommend, rather than pre-scheduling appointments, examine how far ahead patients are booked for appointments. If there are no openings in the hygiene schedule for a solid three-week period and some patients are being bumped into the fourth week, begin increasing the hygiene department’s availability in halfday increments. If you find there is more hygiene time than necessary, develop a patient retention strategy and focus greater attention on filling those extra days. Certainly, for busy dentists who are primarily focused on the demands of caring for patients, it’s easy to seek a quick fix solution to staffing issues. But, if you step back and evaluate the real rather than perceived need for more help, you will spare yourself multiple headaches and ensure that expanding your team is an investment and not a drain on your productivity and your profits.