Top 5 Dental Practice Management articles of 2017

It’s hard to believe it, but 2017 is nearly over.

DPM has been bringing you great articles designed to help you lead your practice smarter and more efficiently all year, but some articles really stood out. These five articles were your favorites this year. Whether they helped you commiserate over that terrible patient or helped you finally understand gingival inflammation code D4346, these were the most-read articles in 2017.

Related article: Top 5 product test drives of 2017

So as you look back on the year and forward to 2018, take a minute to (re)discover everything you need to know about DSOs or CDT codes. You’ll be glad you did!

Click through the slides to see the most popular DPM articles of 2017

The top five types of things patients hate but don’t want to tell you 

by Lisa Newburger, LISW-S

Patients say the craziest things. But, what about the things they are thinking … but not saying?

These are the things that get repeated to their families and friends, but for some odd reason, not to us. The sad thing is that we need to know what they are thinking. We need to know exactly what they hate about us and our practice. (Toughen up people. You can handle it. You just need to find out what “it” is.)

I took a poll to find out what patients hate about the dental practices that they go to.

Click here to read more.

Understanding gingival inflammation code D4346

by Patti DiGangi, RDH, BS

For the dental industry, a fog seems to have settled around the new D4346 gingival inflammation code. For many, it’s a code we hoped for and knew was needed for a long time. Yet there is a lot confusion and our understanding is foggy. I want to clear up some of the fog surrounding this code. Breaking through the fog will reveal specific reasons for patients to return to your practice, thus escalating its profitability.

Click here to read more.

The top 8 worst types of patients in the waiting room 

by Lisa Newburger, LISW-S

Let’s be honest. There are some patients who you want to dump - patients that start trouble as soon as they walk in the door.

There are some patients who the entire staff dreads to see on the schedule because they make everyone’s life miserable, from the front office all the way to the chair. But which ones REALLY get under the front office team’s skin?

Take a look at this list and tell me if I am missing anyone.

Click here to read more.

6 things you need to know to survive the DSO revolution

by Laura Dorr

Are DSOs the future of dentistry? Group practices and DSOs are certainly a growing trend in the dental industry - one that has many solo practitioners and practice owners a little nervous.

But what does the growth of DSOs really mean for the dental industry? How will it affect solo practices? Are solo practices doomed? Is a DSO the right solution for your practice? The bottom line: Whether you are for or against the evolution of group practices and DSOs, you have to keep up with the latest industry trends to be able to navigate the changing landscape and make educated decisions for your practice.

To help, we compiled a list of the top six articles about the DSO revolution that we feel all dental professionals should read.

Click here to read more.

Are DSOs headed for trouble? 

by Dr. Marc Cooper

The juggernaut successes of the meta DSOs such as Heartland, Aspen and Pacific left a slip-stream for others to rapidly grow like Deca and North American Dental Group. Their continued growth and success seems unstoppable. But many DSOs more than likely will follow the path of other companies that had meteoric rises to success only to nosedive.

Click here to read more.