Creating Value in the Dental Hygiene Appointment

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Do you ever feel like you are leading an army but no one is behind you, following your direction? Have you ever wondered: “Why doesn’t anyone else on my team care as much as I do about my practice?!
Is it possible they don’t know what your vision for the practice is? Have you communicated with your team what you dream of for your dental practice?

I believe in the CANI attitude. CANI means “Constant And Never-ending Improvement. This means that you have an open mind to always wanting to be better than you are today.
In today’s blog I want to share with you some ideas to get you on your way to “Creating Value in the Dental Hygiene Appointment.” When you can empower your dental hygienist to have a CANI attitude, you will also discover the hygiene appointment becomes more valuable to the patients, the doctor and hygienist enjoy more satisfaction in what they do and patients become aware of the outstanding services you provide them. Profits in your practice will improve when the team takes ownership of their position. Doctor can now find themselves coming to the office to do dentistry and not manage a dysfunctional team.

Utilizing some or all of these suggestions means that you will also begin to see your production rise as well as develop raving fans from improved patient services provided in your dental office, especially during the dental hygiene appointment.

5 Tips to Create Value in the Dental Hygiene Appointment

1. Morning Team Huddle
Before the morning huddle begins the hygienist needs to audit his or her charts. This means they will be looking for patient service needs. Examples of this are: appropriate x-rays, blood pressure, fluoride, periodic or even a comprehensive exam (Completed every 3-5 yrs.), outstanding treatment, and any family members who are due for a dental appointment (hygiene or restorative). A lot of this information can be found on the routing slips. No flipping through charts during the team huddle. This needs to be a smooth and succinct process which if you don’t do this today, may take 20 minutes when you first begin. When done properly (Baring no more than 2 dentists and 6 team members reporting) a huddle should take about 10 minutes of team time.
For a template of what a morning team huddle looks like, send our office an email: dentalpracticesolutions@gmail.com

2. The Hygienist should (most times) schedule patients’ next visit for hygiene
It works best if the hygienist can always schedule the patient’s next hygiene appointments. Hygienist’s may wondering “Why me?! I am on a treadmill as is and I don’t have time for this!” The reason they are the best person to pre-schedule future hygiene appointments is because they have just looked in the patient’s mouth over the past 45-55 minutes and they are the best person to explain to the patient “WHY” they need to return and what will be completed at the next hygiene appointment.
The hygienist never asks the patient “Would you like to schedule your next appointment?” And the hygienist will not ask the patient “Why can you return for your next hygiene appointment?” The hygienist (and anyone making a patient appointment), needs to take charge of the appointment schedule and not ask patients when they want to return.

3. The Hygienist should always tour the patients mouth with the intra-oral camera
“Pictures paint a thousand words.” This is very true with dental patients as well. Tell patients what you see and then show them exactly what you see in their mouth. This means the patients are more likely to take ownership of their mouth. Sit the patient’s upright in the dental chair. Face them knee-to-knee and eye-to-eye to discuss what you see in their mouth.
This sets the stage for a more effective doctor exam and means the patient will hear about what you see more than one time (from only the dentists’ perspective). It can also mean less time for doctor in the hygiene room talking to the patient. Good news for hygienists that feel doctor makes them run behind.

4. Doctor Hygiene Exam
There is no need for doctor to wait until the end of the hygiene appointment to complete the hygiene patient exam. This can be done after the patient information has been completed. The hygienist will collect all of the patient data and explains this to the patient. This usually takes no longer than 25 minutes at the beginning of the hygiene appointment. Doctor should always be notified by their assistant when there is a break with their patient treatment (possibly waiting for impressions or when the assistant is preparing temporaries, etc.), and now leaves their patient to enter the hygiene treatment room to complete the hygiene patient exam.

The hygienist stops their procedure and introduces doctor or says something related to the patient to doctor (If he or she already knows the patient. Always use the patient and doctors name when doctor enters to complete the exam), and then the dialogue between the hygienist and doctor begins. This dialogue is started by the hygienist gently interrupting doctor in the rapport building phase– relationship continuation conversation (the small chit-chat) with the patient (should not last longer than 90 seconds – no more than 2 mins MAX!). The hygienist will now proceed reporting to doctor about the services completed and what the patient and hygienist see in the patients’ mouth. The hygienist will report on future x-rays and the necessary appointments which include future hygiene appointments (and/or restorative/aesthetic dentistry). The hygienist needs to have x-rays and intra-oral pictures readily available for doctor to easily view.

5. Hygiene Hand-off
How the patient is handed off at the front office is very important. This will build more trust with the patient and the end goal of this system is for the patient to again, understand that they will be returning to your dental office.
Too often, patients are left to walk alone to the front office. All patients need to be escorted to the front office by the hygienist preferably. The hygienist will speak to the front office team member using the patients name and explaining all the services the patient received today. She or he will explain to the front office auxiliary what services are of primary concern which areas of treatment need to be scheduled – while the patient is at the front desk. Best case scenario, the hygienist has scheduled the patients’ next hygiene visit, and the hygienist will also report – in front of the patient – when the next appointment date and time are. She or he will also state what the appointment is scheduled for.

One quick tip: NIX the word “Cleaning” and tell all the team members to stop saying this word as well. Choose to speak to your patients using words that add value. “Dental Hygienists in today’s world – are preventive care specialists.”
Try using some of these words when speaking to patients about a dental hygiene appointment: Dental Hygiene Appointment, Preventive Care, Periodontal Therapy, Scaling and Root Planing, Periodontal Maintenance.
Conclusion

When the dental hygienist is open to the CANI attitude and serving patients at the highest level, your job as the CEO of your dental practice becomes much easier, and more satisfying.
It is possible that you can check off this entire list saying that you are doing all of the above. For some offices, they are only completing a few of these tips and I want to suggest that you just choose one of these to implement this next week. Once you feel comfortable implementing this new system or patient service, go to the next tip and try to implement this one.

Slowly implement them one at a time. Only implement the next tip after you feel that you have the one new service or system “down to a science.” Be patient with yourself and take baby steps to get to your next level of success.
Track and monitor your results to watch your profits improve as you provide that next level of service and patient care. You will also develop patients who are your raving fans!

ABOUT DEBBIE
Debbie is Founder of Dental Practice Solutions since 2000. She serves dental practices globally through her dental hygiene systems and online products. Debbie is known for creating sustainable and profitable dental practices through her vast knowledge of what makes a dental practice successful. She is also known as one of Dentistry Today’s Top Dental Consultants. She has a no-charge 7 Day Dental Hygiene Department Profitability Program that you can get a glimpse of what working with her is like. Grab your 7 Day Program here: 7 DAY DENTAL HYGIENE PROGRAM. She can be reached at: dentalpracticesolutions@gmail.com or call: 503-970-1122

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