Elsevier

Dental Abstracts

Volume 62, Issue 2, March–April 2017, Pages 64-65
Dental Abstracts

The Front Office
Increasing hygiene revenue

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Background

Many dental practices limit their ability to increase their production by not seeing the potential of the dental hygienist. Innovative thinking about the hygiene department’s possible role in the practice can increase hygienist and practice production, help to retain patients, and attract new patients. Methods to maximize production are simple.

Revenue Model

The dental practice should be set up to have 25% of the total revenue contributed by the hygiene department and 75% by the dentist(s). If this is not the case, the dentist should investigate and see if the practice has systems in place to maximize hygiene revenue.

Scheduling for Hygiene

The hygiene department should have a recall target of 98%, yet few achieve this because practices tend to have ineffective patient recall appointment systems in place. Fewer new patients are coming to dental offices, and some patients are always lost. The hygiene program and revenue usually suffer when these two forces are at work and proactive steps aren’t taken.

If the practice is aiming to have a hygiene no-show or last-minute cancellation rate of just 2%, a team effort is required. The

Terminology

Hygienists perform cleaning, which doesn’t sound very important. Using the advertising adage of “If you want something to be taken seriously, name it properly,” these activities need to be retitled to improve their image. Terms that could be considered are “hygiene maintenance” and “cancer oral exam.”

Education and Motivation

Dental hygienists tend to get along well with patients, and this relationship gives them access they can use to educate and motivate patients to engage in good oral health behaviors. Hygienists can also inform patients about dental treatments that could benefit them either right away or in the future. This allows the hygienist to begin a case that is then transferred to the dentist for completion.

Clinical Significance

Lots of activities can be undertaken to improve production in a dental

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Levin RP: The hygiene revenue toolkit. Inside Dent Hyg 12:4-5, 2016 (Special issue 1)

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