Practice Management

Alitta Boechler is a marketing manager at Sikka Software. She holds a Doctorate of Audiology from the University of Iowa and an MBA from the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business at Rice University.  You can contact her at alitta.boechler@sikkasoftware.com or (408) 359-3014.  For more information about The Practice Optimizer CompanyÂ® please visit https://www.sikkasoft.com/dental/sikka-apps/practice-optimizer-dental/

Articles

Because each dental practice is unique in how and where they are located and plans can vary widely in fee schedules, it is difficult to understand when plans are negatively affecting your patients and your practice.

5 ways to tell if dental benefit plans are failing your practice and patients

Keeping your fee schedules up-to-date is imperative to keeping your practice healthy. There are many important factors to take into account including geography, your patients, how you practice and data from other practices in your area. However, quality data on fees in your zip code can be challenging to find-so Sikka Software did the work for you.

The latest fee data for 18 popular procedure codes

Dr. Roger P. Levin is the CEO of Levin Group, a leading dental management consulting firm. Founded in 1985, Levin Group has worked with over 30,000 dental practices. Dr. Levin is one of the most sought-after speakers in dentistry and is a leading authority on dental practice success and sustainable growth. Through extensive research and cutting-edge innovation, Dr. Levin is a recognized expert on propelling practices into the top 10 percent. He has authored 65 books and over 4,000 articles on dental practice management and marketing. He has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Time magazine and is the creator of the Levin Group Tip of the Day, which has over 30,000 subscribers. To contact Dr. Levin, visit www.levingroup.com or email rlevin@levingroup.com. 

"We can learn from our mistakes. But isn’t it better to learn from other people’s mistakes?” Dr. Roger P. Levin explores the biggest mistakes that dentists make-and how those mistakes can be avoided. In this edition, Dr. Levin discusses dental insurance policies.

The biggest mistakes dentists make: Not understanding the insurance picture in the practice

No one has their finger on the pulse of coding changes that will affect your practice more than Teresa Duncan. She stops by to tell us what tweaks have been made that will affect your business.

A look ahead to what dental codes will change and affect your practice in 2016 and beyond

Billions of dollars in dental insurance benefits are left unused every year. These benefits can be used for both general maintenance care as well as dental procedures, like root canals or emergency procedures. According to Forbes, only three percent of patients use all of their dental benefits annually, indicating that there is a significant dollar amount of benefits left untapped at the end of December.

Dental insurance: An untapped source of cash flow

Patti DiGangi, RDH, BS, believes dentistry is no longer just about fixing teeth. Dentistry is oral medÂ­icine. Her work helps dental professionals embrace the opportunities and understand the metrics that accurate insurance coding provides. The ADA recognized her expertise by inviting her to write a chapter in its CDT 2017 Companion book and again for its CDT 2018 Companion. She is the author of the DentalCodeology series of easy-to-read, bite-size books. Her latest book, "Teledentistry: Pathway to Pathology" was co-written with Cindy Purdy, RDH, BS. She can be reached at patti@dentalcodeology.com.

"It isn’t difficult, but it takes team cooperation, new thinking, and practice." That's the mantra from author Patti DiGangi in this article.

How thinking like Twitter can reduce your dental practice's insurance frustration

Teresa Duncan, MS, FADIA, FAADOM is an international speaker who focuses on revenue, dental insurance & management issues. She is a Fellow of the American Association of Dental Office Managers. Her memberships include the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, National Speakers Association and the Academy of Dental Management Consultants. She has been named one of the Top 25 Women in Dentistry by Dental Products Report. Teresa received her Master’s Degree in Healthcare Management.

Teresa Duncan, insurance editor for Dental Products Report, offers advice on how to lower some of the pain that dental insurance causes for so many practices.

5 insurance actions you can take now for a smooth 2016

Christine Taxin is the founder and president of Links2Success, a practice management consulting company to the dental and medical fields. Prior to starting her own consulting company, Taxin served as an administrator of a critical care department at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York City and managed an extensive multi-specialty dental practice in New York. With over 25 years of experience as a practice management professional, she now provides private practice consulting services, delivers continuing education seminars for dental and medical professionals and serves as an adjunct professor at the New York University (NYU) Dental School and Resident Programs for Maimonides Hospital. She can be reached through www.links2success.biz.

Dental professionals are a patient’s primary source of screening within the oral cavity; thus attention must be paid to the most common oral malignancy: squamous cell carcinoma. Historically such malignancies were attributed only to patients with a history of extensive alcohol and tobacco use. However, other risk factors such as human papilloma virus and medication use are shifting the profession’s perception of who may be at risk for oral cancer.

A dental guide to cross-coding for oral cancer screening

Dr. Shelburne, an honor graduate from VCU’s dental school, opened a private general practice in Pennington Gap, Va., in 1981. In 2008, he surrendered his dental license to practice dentistry after being convicted of healthcare fraud and was sentenced to 24 months in federal prison. Now a subject matter expert for the ADA and a nationally known speaker, writer and consultant, Dr. Shelburne candidly shares his mistakes, his experiences, what he learned as a result so others can maximize legitimate reimburse, reduce risk, avoiding the same life-altering experience.

Dental technology and the material sciences are advancing at a rate never before experienced by the dental industry. It is difficult, if not impossible, for the average practitioner to understand and appreciate all the new “stuff” that has been developed and introduced to dentistry over the past 10 years. Things that not too long ago seemed like science fiction have now become reality.

The 5 biggest misconceptions about imaging coding and reimbursement

With November upon us, it is once again time for what has become our annual review of the additions, changes and deletions in CDT benefit coding. Changes in CDT 2016 came under the two general categories: Stand-alone changes and interrelated changes.

Insurance