Episode 691: Tracking Case Acceptance Made Simple

Britt and Tiff talk about the areas critical to having the best case acceptance in your practice. Together, they break down…

• Styles: dollar for dollar and one for one

• What the best tracking programs are

• Tips for follow-up

• What information to collect

Episode resources:

Reach out to Tiff and Britt: [email protected] 

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Transcript:

[music]

0:00:05.8 Kiera Dent: Hey everyone, welcome to the Dental A Team podcast. I'm your host, Kiera Dent, and I had this crazy idea that maybe I could combine a doctor and a team member's perspective because let's face it, dentistry can be a challenging profession with those two perspectives. I've been a dental assistant, treatment coordinator, scheduler, filler, office manager, regional manager, practice owner, and I have a team of traveling consultants where we have traveled to over 165 different offices, coaching teams. Yep. We don't just understand you, we are you. Our mission is to positively impact the world of dental. And I believe that this podcast is the greatest way I can help elevate teams, grow VIP experiences, reduce stress, and create A teams. Welcome to the Dental A team podcast.

[music]

0:00:50.7 KD: Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera. And you guys, you are in for the best treat of your life, consultant takeover. That's right. Get ready. They're dropping some dynamite. Our consulting team is incredible guys, and we are so blessed and so fortunate to have them sharing tips and tricks with you today. And as always, thanks for listening. I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team podcast.

0:01:11.9 Tiff: Back at it again, Brit. I'm so excited to be here with you.

0:01:15.2 Brit: I love podcast days.

0:01:17.3 Tiff: Me too, me too. I love them so much. I like doing it on video. We've always done them on videos together, but now people get to watch it and like it's so cool 'cause I don't know, I have always just loved video. I don't know why I like talking to people like this and just telling them all of the things that are in my brain. Thank you for joining me on this adventure.

0:01:38.3 Brit: Absolutely.

0:01:38.8 Tiff: Like it's always an adventure with me, so you are my... [chuckle] You are ride or die for me, Brit. You just lift me up, let's do it Tiff. And I appreciate that about you.

0:01:47.6 Brit: We love an adventure, so why not?

[laughter]

0:01:50.0 Tiff: I really do, I'm learning that about myself. I truly think I love an adventure. I'm... Kiera always tells me, you are the first person that's just like, "Yeah, let's try it. I'm down." And I'm like, "No."

[chuckle]

0:02:04.1 Tiff: I think I am though. I think that I love being like, "Yeah, let's see what happens. Let's freaking go. Yes, Brit, let's go hiking. Let's just go. Let's do it. We will make it work." I do. I love an adventure.

0:02:16.2 Brit: You are that person. I do love an adventure also. You might like it a little more than me, but I still love an adventure.

0:02:22.3 Tiff: I think it's one of those things that it's like, "Is it a good thing or a bad thing?" It depends on the day, but like, you know how you have those traits that it's really, really good until it's not good. I think that's one of them.

[chuckle]

0:02:32.8 Tiff: One day I'm gonna be like, yeah, this is why it's not good and this is why.

[laughter]

0:02:36.9 Brit: Yep. There's always the yin and the yang to it, the good and the best.

0:02:41.2 Tiff: Yeah. It's [0:02:41.4] ____, I feel it.

0:02:41.6 Brit: But we're for adventure today, man. Let's podcast, let's talk about it. We have...

[overlapping conversation]

0:02:47.1 Tiff: I love it. I do and am excited about this one because I love nothing more than figuring out with my practices things that they didn't think were possible, I guess is a good way to say it or they're like, oh, I have this problem and I can't figure out how to solve it. And I'm like, wait, I have a really simple solution for you. And I think today we have a simple solution for everyone. And while it's not the easiest habit to create, we will say, it's a really simple solution. And once you do create that habit, like you'll figure out that there's just no going back from what we're about to talk about. I want you, tell them, Brit, tell them how you're going to save their lives with today's implementation.

0:03:28.3 Brit: Guys, if you are not tracking your case acceptance within your office to actually know how we're doing, you're missing out. I'm sorry, I'm just gonna say it. You're missing out.

0:03:40.9 Tiff: Yes. How do you even know, Brit, how do you know if you're not tracking it? What do you hear? What are the most common things you hear when you talk to a practice?

0:03:49.6 Brit: One is, Well, we schedule everybody. So like we don't need to, we're doing grace.

0:03:54.0 Tiff: Nobody walks out of the door...

0:03:54.9 Brit: That's what I hear.

0:03:56.0 Tiff: Appointment.

0:03:56.6 Brit: Yeah. That's a common one I hear. I don't have the time. That one we here off set. I don't have the time to track it. Well you don't like... You have to have the time.

0:04:08.6 Tiff: Yeah. You don't have the time.

0:04:09.6 Brit: Can afford not to. Yeah, exactly.

[chuckle]

0:04:13.2 Brit: Those are probably some of my most common ones.

0:04:15.2 Tiff: Yeah.

0:04:15.4 Brit: Or they just... Or people just don't know how. It sounds more intimidating than it actually is.

0:04:20.7 Tiff: Yeah. I agree. I agree. I also enjoy, and I think we get this a lot when we're interviewing, for a consultant or when we're helping practices interview for TCs oh yeah. I have a 95% case acceptance rate. I'm like, "Dang girl, that's pretty fantastic."

[laughter]

0:04:37.3 Brit: I hope you do.

0:04:38.4 Tiff: I hope you do. I know, I love it. And then you say, okay, great, how did you track it? And Brit, there's two ways to track it, right? There's dollar for dollar and one for one. That's how we call it. That's how we do it. Most of the time everybody is... Most of the time people are doing it one for one. So dollar for dollar to break it down would be, this is the amount we diagnosed and this is the amount of that diagnosis that was accepted.

0:05:04.1 Brit: The dollar amount.

0:05:04.9 Tiff: So we diagnosis, the literally the dollar amount. Yeah. So it's dollar for a dollar.

[chuckle]

0:05:10.2 Tiff: Literally a percentage of the whole diagnosis amount was accepted. One for one, people love one for one, and I don't disagree, I think it's awesome. But one for one is did they schedule or did they not. Now, I'm gonna go on my little tangent and then Brit, follow up with your own.

0:05:30.6 Brit: Yes, let's go for it. I'm here for it. Let's hear it.

[laughter]

0:05:33.9 Tiff: It's an adventure. I'm on a roll today. [laughter] Coming off of an event and I'm a little sleepy, and so I'm like I'm on an adventure role today. So I think you should track both, if you're gonna do one for one, I'm totally fine with one for one, but I think it's an ego boost and that is the only reason for it. I wanna know the reality. And my opinion is, and this is how I was trained by... I was trained by consultants, by trained people who trained me how to do it. And I was like, "Yeah, you're right. I can schedule all of this treatment." And I freaking did guys, if you came to me, my doctor and you had three crowns and six fillings and it was gonna take two appointments, three appointments, you had implants, it was gonna take five. I don't freaking care.

0:06:17.2 Tiff: I scheduled all of that treatment or at least as much as I could out, and I had payments in full ahead of time. I had payment plans ready, I had care credits going, I had the Wells Fargo loans at applied for, it was done deal. So I know it can be done. It is the non-ego boost. It is the ego hurts because if you come to me and you've got five crowns and I can only convince that patient to schedule that first appointment out of five, my case acceptance is crap. And as a treatment coordinator, it kind of hurts. It dings the ego and you're like, "No, they scheduled, how am I supposed to schedule all of that?" They can't even get that done yet. To Kind of, they can.

[laughter]

0:07:00.0 Tiff: Kind of they can. So, and fill your schedule. So the ego boost is the one for one, the dollar for dollar is the reality in my opinion. Because that... And every treatment coordinator will tell you, "I'm gonna schedule the next one. I'm gonna make sure that they don't leave that appointment without the next appointment. That's our job", for sure. But when they come back for that next crown, what if that patient says, "Hey, Guess what? I actually ended up buying a Louis Vuitton handbag and I don't have the money anymore to get the rest of this treatment done. It's gonna have to wait." Well, Guess what? It's not accepted ladies and gents, it's not accepted. That's my tangent. I like the dollar for dollar because I think it's real. I think it's real. And I think the other one is fantastic and it's totally fine, but it's an ego boost and it's kind of fluff.

0:07:50.6 Brit: Yep. I love your tangent. I love it.

[laughter]

0:07:52.8 Brit: I think of your one to one or like your patient acceptance that at least they did something. It's kind of like, well like yeah, I ate my vegetables, right?

[laughter]

0:08:06.8 Tiff: Yeah.

0:08:07.9 Brit: Like I had strawberry ice cream or like...

0:08:10.4 Tiff: Yeah, for sure.

0:08:11.5 KD: I had strawberry ice cream. Like yeah, there's fruit in there. There's also a lot of other stuff in there. Like it's not the full story of what's actually going on. And you're a dollar for dollar and that's your higher law. That's your higher standard and we wouldn't be going by the higher standard. So sure if you're struggling even with your one-to-one, like great work on your one-to-one, but my ultimate I need to get you to is to getting that dollar for dollar up.

0:08:35.2 Tiff: I totally agree. I love that. That was a good way to wrap it. Good job.

[laughter]

0:08:38.1 Tiff: You're still gonna wrapping me up. I love it. I love it. So case acceptance is awesome to track and there are a few caveats, right? And there are a lot of programs that we'll do it for you and I'm totally done with those. I think they're awesome, but the one that's going to do you the most service and really tell you the honest, true story and that you can manipulate to show you what you need it to show is gonna be by hand you guys. We it's... We call it the OGs, the oldie put goodies.

[laughter]

0:09:07.6 Tiff: The OGs and I love it. It's just an Excel spreadsheet you guys. Simple is always best and sometimes you don't have to make changes and make things grandiose and superhuman for them to be really cool and user friendly still. So we just use an Excel spreadsheet. I like this because it's the raw data. A lot of those programs will pull in everything and give you like if you've got options and maybe a patient decided I'm gonna do the implant and not the bridge because I don't need work on those other two, three, four teeth, that bridge doesn't get deleted and then you've got an implant was accepted, but the bridge is still there. It's just kind of mucky. It's not as clean. Totally fine. And I'm totally fine if you use those. I don't care as long as you know your numbers. But clean it up, do clean it up. Do the Excel spreadsheet and then a couple other pieces that I really love about the Excel spreadsheet is that again, you can manipulate it. So I like to track which team members had a hand in the case acceptance because then I can dial in on training. I can dial in on where are we really good, who's fantastic and can train people who maybe aren't as fantastic yet. Do I have a doctor and a hygiene team, right?

0:10:22.0 Tiff: If this doctor gets with this hygienist, they diagnose everything and they sell it all. The same doctor gets with this hygienist and it's a little lackluster, then I know, okay, let's look at some co-diagnosis. What's happening in our hygiene department? Are we calibrated as a hygiene team on co-diagnosing? Because that same doctor has very different diagnosis in those rooms. It tells me that there's a calibration problem there. Most of the time we see low case acceptance and we harp on our treatment coordinators could totally be our treatment coordinator. But guess what? How am I gonna find that out? I'm gonna see that the doctor and hygienists are consistent and the inconsistencies in my case presenters. That's how we dial it in.

0:11:11.0 Tiff: Otherwise we're just throwing things, we're throwing monstrous amounts of solutions trying to cover things up. It's like putting a band-aid on your arm when it's like green and passy. You just put a band-aid on there instead of going to the doctor and getting the antibiotic.

0:11:25.5 Brit: I'm with you. I'll add a little plug. If you're using either your dental software and analytics platform, something like that to track case acceptance like Tiff said, you need to know the data points it's using to make sure we're entering the correct data points so that we get good information. Because that's also a big complaint I hear from teams as well. Like, well that's not right. So then they just start to like completely discount whatever percentage is coming from their system because...

0:11:54.0 Tiff: That is for sure.

0:11:54.4 Brit: They're like, "No it's not right." Which is where we do love a spreadsheet. I love a spreadsheet. Tiff loves a spreadsheet.

0:12:00.5 Tiff: Me too.

0:12:00.6 Brit: Because it makes it very easy to track and I'll make it a spreadsheet by doctor so that I can keep track by doctor and their treatment coordinator on there and a hygienist or assistant that was there with them. I'm with you absolutely Tiff on that. And you can track your patient one-to-one and your dollar acceptance on there. Plus it's real good for follow up guys. I'm just gonna say it's my favorite for follow up.

0:12:27.6 Tiff: Oh yes, for sure. I love that. Okay, so two things. One, I love... And I'm making notes, you know that.

[laughter]

0:12:33.3 Tiff: I love that you're like, you track one to one and dollar for dollar track them both. You guys give yourselves an ego boost. I'm not against that ego boost treatment coordinators. I am not. Because I have been there and I have been at the bottom barrel of my day where everybody treated me like crap and nobody wanted to do treatment and I look and I'm like 5%. I'm not surprised.

[laughter]

0:12:52.6 Tiff: I sucked today. So I felt that I know it. I'm not saying that it's not there, I'm just saying know the reality of both pieces and be able to diagnose what's truly happening. So I love that you said to do both of those. And I love...

0:13:04.6 Brit: And I [0:13:04.7] ____ to tackle the right problem. I'm gonna interrupt you for a quick second. Tackle the right problem, right? If I am like rocking away at getting the patients to do at least something, then I'm like, great. My next push is to try and get them to do quadrant dentistry or half a mouth dentistry. Like it tells me where I can focus on improving my skills.

0:13:21.9 Tiff: For sure. I love that. Also on that same vein, you spun my mind again. It's totally fine. On that same vein, it also will help you figure out if you're getting delivered single tooth quadrant dentistry. The whole shipping or one thing. Because if your practice... You're right. If your doctors aren't practicing delivering everything or they are not practicing quadrant dentistry and it's making it so that you can't practice that, now you know that there's calibration. So, I love that, Brit. Good thinking. And then you said...

[laughter]

[overlapping conversation]

0:13:53.8 Brit: Tiff, Sometimes we just add a little id towards the invention.

[laughter]

0:14:00.4 Tiff: You are right. I do like a good dental too I know. Dang it. Dang it. I'm learning so much about myself this year.

[laughter]

0:14:05.8 Tiff: It's fine. And then you mentioned follow up and I think that's huge. And we like the 2, 2, 2. Two days. Two weeks, two months. And it's really easy to put it on there. I have a practice, the practice that I just implemented this with last week actually. And we were like, let's just get really smart with this. And we just did little like check marks. I know that there's other practices that will we'll put in the actual date for when the follow-up needs to come because then you can just do the find on your Exel spreadsheet to find and replace and you type in today's date and and it'll pull up everybody you are supposed to call. So no matter what you can get to everybody. But we do...

0:14:40.9 Brit: Just like what we did good color coating. So like if they scheduled, I'll make it green. If they didn't, I'll make it red. So like I know the ones I need to follow up with.

0:14:51.2 Tiff: I do like that. And I have to say that when I was in practice and I did it, I... Well I have to give my office manager of many years a little bit of credit because I used to go crazy with her highlighting on documents and I was like, I don't understand. She would highlight what she finished and leave what she didn't finish yet white. And I was like, "Isn't that the opposite?" Like, "Wouldn't you highlight what needs to be done?" And I don't know if it's that it actually makes sense to do it or if I got used to seeing it that way 'cause there was no changing her mind. But now that's how I operate in life. And so I would do the same thing on my tracker. If they scheduled, I would like do a gray highlight on it so that I would just look for the white space in her defense. Like it's easier to look for a white space than color. I don't know. I think she just convinced me. But that's all...

0:15:35.1 Brit: You find your own system. I'll have that... I'll have office managers be like, I've got my color code system. I'm like, great. As long as everybody knows your color coding system, go for it.

0:15:43.5 Tiff: Yeah, that was her. She was like, "This is the system and this is what everyone in this practice is going to do." And now forever for the rest of my life, that's the only way I know how to do it. So it worked. Kudos to Amy. She did awesome training me. But I think that follow up is key. And again, we do that 2, 2, 2. So if you're tracking it, the things that you wanna track will kind of refresh this. Aside from my crazy tangents today. Tracking, you are gonna track the date, obviously the patient's name, the dollar amount that was presented, okay? The dollar amount that was presented, the dollar amount that was scheduled, meaning it was accepted. And I like this caveat, y'all do with it what you will. [chuckle]

0:16:21.1 Tiff: My, a full case acceptance to me is that it is scheduled and it is paid for. So pre-payments are fantastic. Making sure that you've got that payment secured in some way is huge because production is nothing if you can't collect it. So patient name, diagnosis amount, what was presented, what was accepted, the date that they scheduled, okay. And then the note or the reason as to why they didn't schedule if they didn't. And then that follow up the 2, 2, 2. Two days, two weeks, two months. And then highlight in whatever color coating system you choose to use. But make sure that it's easy to see. And then also on top of that, make sure your providers right. You want your doctor column, you want your hygienist column. And I know in Excel you can do dropdowns. I love dropdowns because if you do the dropdowns, there's no human error in spelling. And then you guys can take it a step further.

0:17:19.5 Tiff: Don't ask me how I'm still trying to figure it out I have... I'll figure it out next week. I have an office. We're trying to figure this out Brit might know. But you can actually pull all of that data from the dropdown so you can pull how many times that name on the dropdown populated. So then you can see how many exams those providers had done and then you can key in on their production. So anyways, I'm not an Excel wizard by any means, but I'm getting really freaking good with it. I'm gonna give myself some kudos there. I had to call... I had to phone a friend yesterday and he's like, "Oh, you can totally do that. Yes."

[laughter]

0:17:49.8 Brit: The answer is usually like if you're... I'm wondering can I do it with... Do it with Excel, like 95% of the time the answer's yes.

[laughter]

0:17:57.1 Tiff: I'm loving that. I've never loved Excel. Maybe now see this is probably your influence.

[laughter]

0:18:02.9 Tiff: Your little spreadsheet wizard over there. But I've never loved Excel as much as I have this past year.

[chuckle]

0:18:08.1 Tiff: I feel like I have done more spreadsheets and figured out more... I don't know, we're probably diving into numbers more this year than we did last year. Things are changing. Anyways that's a treatment tracker and I think start tracking now. If you're not, if you are, how can you update the treatment tracker that you have? Is there a next layer that you could add on that might help you see where training could be necessary? Or it's help you see that you're freaking killing it. You guys give yourselves kudos. Do a one-to-one and a dollar for a dollar boost those egos. I love it. I like to know that but also do your dollar for dollar and make sure your follow-up is on your treatment checker no matter what.

0:18:45.5 Tiff: So if that's your extra layer added in there, if not, it's probably the providers and or the dollar amount. Add those pieces in there and then just freaking start doing it. It's easy. I'm telling you once you get the habit in there and Brit, I don't know about you, but I really like to have it in a Google drive. Because even a shared drive on the computer, you have to be out like not... You can't... Multiple people can't be in it at the same time. So if you have multiple people doing treatment plans in the practice, you have to like run around and figure out who's in the tracker before you can add stuff in there. Google Drive or any kind of system like that OneNote. All of those things will... It's like real time. So I can be in there updating it and Brit can be in there adding her own pieces and it'll both stick. It'll be in there.

0:19:32.5 Brit: For sure. I think one more thing we've gotta clarify, Tiff, I know I've gotten this question before. And if I come back and I schedule that patient like next month...

[laughter]

0:19:43.6 Brit: Do I get to count it in my case, acceptance?

[laughter]

0:19:46.7 Tiff: I agree. And you know what I see happen? I see them put that patient on this month's tracker or this week's tracker and I'm like, "No girl, you didn't present that, again." If you wanna... I did have, I had... [chuckle] I had so many amazing people work for me for the years and I always had the funnest things come up. And I remember her, we're still friends today and she... I'm sure just secretly loves me. But she was that treatment coordinator where she was like, before her one-on-one every month, she spent hours of her own time going back through her trackers to make sure that they were 100% updated if that patient had accepted the treatment later or not. And she would put it in there. And I was like, girl, that's totally fine. I don't care. You guys, the answer to that is I don't care if you're doing your follow up, you're on your two weeks and they're like, heck yeah, let's get scheduled. Change it on that tracker. Do not add it to your new tracker. It's not due to new diagnosis. Change it on that tracker to accept it. I don't freaking care. It finally was accepted. Absolutely. I truly don't care.

0:20:49.2 Brit: It's nicer. It's nicer. I'm at end of the month. End of the month guys. It's got... It's gotta be scheduled within the month and then we move on to the next month.

[laughter]

0:20:56.8 Tiff: Well, and I agree. I think, within the month for sure. And that's what I told my treatment coordinator. She had to have it in by the end of the month. It was on her one-on-one and if it changed after that, I didn't care. Like for your own good, fine. If you wanna look back on it and it makes you happier, by all means, but it doesn't do anything as far as like reporting your numbers anymore after that closes. It's totally done. That was a good one.

[laughter]

0:21:21.3 Tiff: Why didn't I think of that. Anything else you can think of that we need to add in there?

0:21:23.9 Brit: No, I think that was the last one. It's just...

0:21:26.5 Tiff: I love it.

0:21:26.9 Tiff: Month-end numbers are month-end numbers. So you can update... I'm with you. Update it, whatever you want to by the end of the month. By the end of the month closed out and has to be scheduled. At least scheduled to count.

0:21:37.9 Tiff: I agree. Awesome. I love it. Okay, so go start tracking your treatment if you're not doing it already.

0:21:43.0 Brit: Game changer.

0:21:43.9 Tiff: Just go do it. Find that layer. What did you say, Brit?

0:21:46.5 Brit: Game changer.

0:21:47.4 Tiff: Game changer. Yeah, it is. You guys, it is like, don't try to find solutions for problems you might not have. Okay. Just figure out what the problem is and then find solutions for that. It takes way less time. And on that note, please go do it. Let us know what you think. Drop us a review. We love to hear about these, we love to see those five stars come through. And we really love for the community that's also looking at these reviews to know what's working and what's not working for you as they listen to these same podcasts. It's really cool. And we get a lot of awesome feedback for that. If you need help, if you want examples, if you are like, "Hey, I can't visualize this Tiff, throw me a spreadsheet." Email us hello at the dentalateam.com, we are here to give you our hearts and our souls and we will surely send you the examples that you need.

0:22:32.5 Tiff: Can't wait to hear from you and hear your five star review. Brit, thank you for going on so many adventures with me today, it was a wild one.

0:22:39.8 Brit: [0:22:40.0] ____.

0:22:40.1 Tiff: And I know everyone enjoyed.

[laughter]

0:22:42.2 Tiff: And I can't wait to podcast with you again, Brit. Thank you.

0:22:46.6 Brit: Yeah, thanks for having me, Tiff.

0:22:48.0 Tiff: Of course, of course. All right, everyone, we will talk to you soon.

[music]

0:22:55.0 KD: And that wraps it up for another episode of the Dental A Team Podcast. Thank you so much for listening and we'll talk to you next time.

[music]