Does your practice have a recall plan for your patients? Most orthodontists and dentists don’t have a recall plan. Why? Because Patient recall can feel tedious. And because you have actual patients to take care of.
However, if you don’t have a process for patient recall, which might look like a series of communications with your patients (other than emails and texts) these people may slip through the cracks.
We know patient recall for your practice is important…but it often gets shoved to the sidelines to be focused on “at another time.”
Why should your dental or orthodontic practice focus on patient recall this year? Because data tells us that “new patients only account for about 9%... the other 81% comes from your existing patient base.”
In 2022, you can’t afford to ignore your patient recall process.
Luckily, there are so many ways you can start to use teledentistry tools to help you with recall.
Here are the top 3 ways you can optimize your clinic for better patient recall in 2022:
- Use automation..but track and follow up.
Automation saves you time, money, people hours, and ultimately, can be the thing that really optimizes your practice. The low-hanging fruit with automation is scheduling your patient’s appointments. According to Group Dentistry Now, for any given practice:
- 60% of patients are unscheduled
- 45% of patients are due or late
- 15% either cancel or miss their appointments
That leaves a lot of opportunities, and frankly, a lot of business on the table.
So you’ve automated…what’s the problem many practices have? They automate, but then don’t have a good system to keep track of the messages, response rate, etc.
As a result?
Only 9% of patients answer an automated recall message. You have to find a system that helps you both successfully use automation but then also responds to the next steps. This might look like automation combined with coordinated outreach. Remember: people usually need 5 to 7 messages before they will act!
- Train your Team and Incentivize Them
Training your team to recognize simple steps that can be done to invite patient recall is a very simple but helpful way you can see more for your clinic. This might look like every team member asking your patients to plug your clinic’s number into their phone, or giving them a sheet of paper with your information.
It might look like posting signs on the doors to schedule their next appointments, or rotating having someone from the office call patients during nights and weekends (when they are more likely to pick up).
Lastly, who doesn't love healthy competition? And when that competition is backed up by a prize, even better? It sounds elementary, but when you create a bonus system for who can get the most recall appointments for the week or month, you might see a real uptick in productivity.
- Invest in a HIPAA-compliant telehealth platform.
If you have your patients on our In Hand Dental platform, it is very easy to send them a variety of messages including a brief video. You can even segment your patients into several care groups, and send one to many messages specifically to a particular care group. Don’t forget that you can use our app for treatment, but also for messaging outside of regular appointments, like for birthdays and giveaways, which keeps you top of mind. Also, because the message is coming to their phone through the app, the open rate is much stronger.
Want to learn more about how the In Hand Dental app can help you with patient recall in 2022? Click here