Retention

One of the key elements of a successful practice is the ability to turn new patients into "returning patients." Just as a saving account grows exponentially with time due to compound interest, a practice grows exponentially as patients return year after years as patients return and refer their family and friends to the practice. The cost of maintaining a patient is minor compared with those associated with getting a new patient, but unfortunately is seems that most dental practices pay more attention to prospecting than to maintaining. This is short sighted indeed.

A worth while project for a staff meeting would be to review the list of new patients from the previous mouth and evaluate the services that you provided for each of them to determine if you have done everything that you possibly could have to insure that all of those new patients will be returning to your office in six months. This exercise could have some interesting results. If your find that most have not completed the recommended dental work, you might want to look at your case presentation and office procedures. If your are doing a good job of selling necessary work, perhaps your billing procedures are deterring patients from completing work or perhaps you your credit policies are too stringent. An other possibility could be that your communication lines between the front and back office are so muddled that you are not instilling confidence in the patients. If the work was completed, has the billing been handled properly? Was the patient preappointed for their next hygiene appointment? Were post operative concerns resolved satisfactorially?

By completing the above procedure for several months, you will be able to increases the percentage of those new patients who return again year after year. One of the real pleasure of a dental practice is the having the opportunity of seeing patients year after year as the are converted from "new patients' into "returning patients' and ultimately into "friends."