Reduce hours with no decrease in production

While working with a practice open 4 days per week, I observed the doctor had time most days to browse the Internet and meet with me during what was supposed to be time with patients. We considered 4 possible solutions:
1) Get more patients in the door
2) Perform more services per patient
3) Cut doctor hours
4) Do nothing

Although attractive, solution #1 was infeasible in the short-term because we lacked a method to bring an instantaneous flood of patients in the door. After benchmarking the doctor’s procedure frequency against other practices, we determined the doctor was performing a reasonable number of procedures per patient given his treatment philosophy and the type of practice he wanted. Further, any reasonable changes in treatment recommendations were too small to close the gap between the current hours in the office and hours needed to perform procedures. So we ruled out #2. Solution #4 was our last choice.

Through an analysis of the schedule and patient load, we determined the doctor could easily meet the patient demand for services working 3 days per week. However, the single hygienist could not handle the patient load on 3 days per week. Since the doctor had an op available for a second hygienist, we found a hygienist available to work a second hygiene room one day per week.

Outcome: The doc now works 3 days per week instead of 4 with NO decrease in production.

Introduction

As founding partner of Proveer Practice Management (http://www.proveerpm.com/), I work with dentists for a living. I chose this line of work because:
a) Dentists are often business owners but are experts in something other than business.
b) I often observe room for five and six figure improvements in the wealth of my clients.
c) It is fun!

The roughly 100,000 dental practices in the US face some common challenges and there’s no shortage of companies promoting universal solutions – practice management consultants, financial planners, continuing education seminars and institutes, software and equipment vendors, supply reps, and more. However, each dentist has her own values, talents, constraints, ethics, and set of circumstances. Rather than sell universal solutions, I promote the application of good business principles to each unique situation.

Lacking universal solutions and recognizing that teaching good business principles is too big a bite for this blog to chew, I plan to offer a series of stories and comments from my interactions with dentists.

Enjoy!