There’s one thing that affects your practice’s success the most, and it has nothing to do with marketing, referrals, or even patient satisfaction. 

Rather, it’s the effectiveness of your internal culture. 

It would be foolish to assume that putting five to fifteen people together in an office would never result in any type of conflict. And when there’s conflict, the patient experience ultimately suffers. 

Practice owners must understand how to mitigate their effects quickly to avoid any delays in your achievements. 

Take a look at our three best practices for improving employee relations to maintain a professional, productive environment:

#1 - Understand Time Spent vs Time Wasted

Doctors have a lot of knowledge, but very little time to share it. When you do take time to train or work with your staff, you view it as an investment. 

And, as a general rule, you expect an ROI on that investment. 

But this investment becomes a...

Learn how PANDA Perio empowers staff to participate and succeed!

The need to take control of clinical documentation and fine-tune communication across all clinical channels is easily solved with professional strategies offered by PANDA Perio clinical software. 

Created from the ground up, by a team of leading Periodontists and an experienced software engineer. PANDA Perio has saved clinics countless hours in writing treatment letters and enabled staff toward more professional communication. 

Learn how these five strategies have streamlined treatment planning and empowered staff to help dental practices grow by as much as 300%. 

Templates Streamline Note-taking 

PANDA Perio’s exclusive Instanotes® guide staff to quickly complete accurate notes in a quick click-through process. No need to repeat or transcribe the details later after the appointment. It’s streamlined to save time eliminating the need to type. 

Checklist Completion...

We recently sent out a survey to Periodontists and PANDA Perio users to gain insights on the industry. Our goal at PANDA has always been to provide real, actionable advice you can use in your practice, but we also use this information to make our software even better. 

If you haven’t yet taken the survey, you can do so here.

Your responses will give you personalized results that you can apply to your unique practice. But here’s a little preview on what you can expect:

Preparation Encourages Profitability

Whether you’re brand new to the Periodontal field or you’ve been treating patients for 20 years or longer, the value of preparation never changes. 

Because of the many moving parts the Periodontist faces each day, it’s important to have a system in place so that no task or detail falls through the cracks. When you can be prepared for every patient, phone call, and meeting, you can avoid backlogs or having to redo work.

Find Opportunities to...

As a practice owner, it’s important to realize that your practice’s success doesn’t just hinge on your ability to treat patients. Even the most skilled Periodontists can find themselves struggling to bring in patients and improve referral relationships.

Much of your success depends on having an engaged, professional staff that can contribute to the patient experience, referral relations, and other aspects of your practice. But for staff to be successful in their roles, they must be able to overcome any barriers that get in between them, and a job well done.

Take a look at four of the biggest issues that prevent staff from living up to their potential and how you can help them overcome these obstacles:

#1 - Failed Leadership

This is a tough pill to swallow because it requires the practice owner to take responsibility for the staff’s failures. However, success starts at the top and isn’t possible without strong leadership. 

One of the biggest ways...

If you’re the only Periodontist in your area, then you may be fortunate to earn referral traffic from local dentists simply because you’re in business. But this isn’t the reality for most Periodontists. 

Most often, there are several other periodontal practices in your city. Many dentists who refer to Periodontists will send their patients to the practice across the street for simplicity’s sake. After all, Periodontists are all the same, right? 

We know that’s not true, but it’s not easy to communicate this with referring dental practices. 

So, what makes you special enough to convince dentists to send their patients a few extra miles for treatment? 

If you’re not already prioritizing these factors to earn more referrals, you should be:

Build the Relationship

More than 99% of the time, referrals aren’t going to happen on their own. Rather, Periodontists must be proactively building and nurturing relationships with...

Periodontists and general dentists share a common goal: to provide patients with effective dental treatment. 

Though methodologies and approaches are different for each party, they share a common clientele that often requires the services of both. 

However, many dentists prefer to treat periodontal patients in-house rather than referring out. That can make it seem as though the two are battling for business rather than working toward a common goal. 

Being the specialist, Periodontists are in a better position to show how they can work with dentists rather than against them.

Emphasizing Everyone’s Best Interest

The most important thing you can do when working with dentists is to stress the importance of working for the patient's overall health, not just the practice or specialty.  It’s easy to say we care about the patient’s best interest and this is why we approach the care the way we do. It’s a universal understanding.  But the...

Referrals are the lifeblood of periodontal practices.  We recently talked about practical ways to build relationships with general dentists to earn referral business, starting with the importance of establishing trust. 

Making a referral isn’t a decision dentist's and doctor's take lightly.  Their own reputation is on the line, and referrals often serve as an extension of their own practice. 

Explore these four things periodontists can offer dentists and physicians to build trust and strengthen your referral business:

An Under-Promise and Over-Delivery Mentality

Even with good intentions, periodontists shouldn’t make claims they can’t fully guarantee. When speaking about your practice or how you handle referred patients, it’s always better to under promise and over deliver in order to build faith and maintain trust.

Faster Communication and Inclusion in the Treatment Process

Most periodontists spend a full workday drafting correspondence...

Dental patients are dependent on the expertise of their general dentist. Whether dentists refer patients to a periodontal specialist or offer to provide periodontal treatment in-house, patients are likely to comply. 

Because of this high level of trust between general dentists and patients, building relationships with dentists to earn referral power is non-negotiable. 

So what can periodontists do to build a relationship with dentists as powerful as that between dentists and their patients to the point where dentists don’t have to think twice about sending patients to your practice? 

It starts by creating trust and goodwill before discussing any business.

Trust Shouldn’t Be Sacrificed for Profits

Referrals make up a large portion of a periodontal practice’s revenue, but profits should never come before trust. 

Periodontists should build their referral relationships on trust rather than business. By doing so, specialists create sustainable value...

Dental implants are becoming a desirable alternative to traditional periodontal treatment. Patients see them as a viable, attractive solution to improve their smiles quickly and dentists can charge high fees. But, do we understand the dangers of dental implants without effective treatment planning?

While generally safe and effective, dental implants can be more problematic for certain patients if diagnosis and treatment plans are ignored.

As a result, patients are ultimately the ones who suffer from an ineffective dental implants process. It’s largely up to dentists to prevent their negative effects. Below we'll be looking at some of the dangers of a poor dental implants procedure.

Dental Implants in a Compromised Periodontium

As all periodontists already know, dental implants have been hailed as a solution for tooth loss. But patients experiencing tooth loss from periodontal disease may be at greater risk for implant failure if the underlying periodontal...

A round-up of four common periodontal software solutions for easy comparison

When it comes to choosing software for your periodontal practice, most practice owners face two choices: opt for a general management software or choose one specifically made for the dental industry. There are countless options for the former given their basic nature, but finding the best solutions for periodontal’s unique needs isn’t so easy. 

For starters, there aren’t nearly as many industry-specific options compared to general practice management. And of the industry solutions that do exist, many of them are more heavily tailored to general dentistry and not periodontal professionals.

 We’ve rounded up four of top software products for periodontal professionals so you can compare their features and make an informed decision for your practice:

Fast Notes App

Fast Notes is a cloud-based app that’s still fairly new in the periodontal community. It’s touted as a...