Missed opportunities with Emergency Patients

How Many of Your Emergency/Limited Exam Patients Convert to Long-Term Patients?

Dental assistants, did you know that you have a huge impact in the case acceptance process?  You can help your patients get out of crisis mode by planting a seed based on prevention and being pro-active vs. reactive. You have a critical role!

What do you do when you get a call requesting a limited exam?

1. Schedule them within the parameters of your Patient Reservation System – if you have frequent emergency calls, you might consider blocking a few minutes of emergency-only time right after your planning appointments in the afternoon.

2. Treat the Emergency ONLY – if your patient is in pain, get them out of pain. Do NOT stop everything to do full-fledged treatment. This is not fair to the patients that are already on the schedule, it’s difficult to make effective payment arrangements on the fly, AND you are reinforcing crisis-focused behavior.

3. Once the patient is out of pain, or if there was not any discomfort to begin with, interview them just as you would any other new patient. Of course the questions will be geared toward the ‘chief complaint’ to begin with – but once you’ve addressed the reason they came in to see you, ask permission to talk about the rest of their mouth. ‘Tell me about the rest of your teeth – how are they feeling?’ ‘Would you like for us to take a look at other areas?’ ‘What if we could prevent emergencies from happening altogether – would that be helpful?’ All of these questions are gearing the patient toward a planning appointment.

 ‘Emergency’ Patients + Planning Appointment = Win-Win 

• There’s something that’s kept them away from the dentist that has resulted in a broken tooth or pain – money, time or fear/anxiety.  If you are diligent in seeking information from the patient instead of giving information, you'll gain insight as to what motivates the patient and how you can best help them. 

• We often ‘fix’ a tooth for an emergency patient, then we do not see them again until they are in the same situation. A planning appointment can help them prevent finding themselves in another unexpected dental crisis.

• The last thing a patient with a crisis-mindset wants to do is come in next to see the hygienist, get their teeth cleaned, a full set of x-rays and complete exam – all so that we can tell them what else is wrong with them. When you fix a tooth at a last minute ‘emergency’ visit, the chance of success with hygiene as their follow up visit is pretty slim. By inviting them back to come up with a plan to prevent further emergencies and over come whatever objections they have (save time, money, etc.), the next step is patient-driven. This can be accomplished through the planning appointment process