InPractice: The Goetze Dental Blog

When it comes to dental equipment, preventative maintenance is a must. Equipment must be properly cared for to keep instruments working at peak performance for as long as possible, but also you—as the health care provider—and your patient must be kept safe from infection. Through preventative maintenance tasks daily, weekly, monthly and annually, your dental practice lessens the chances of unexpected equipment failures resulting in downtime, as well as more importantly, safety concerns. 

Did you know Goetze Dental turned 135 years old on September 24, 2019? Marking the occasion, the fifth generation of leadership stepped into executive management with Ben Brunker named president and David Brunker named chief operating officer.  Owners and fourth generation family members, Don and Janet Brunker, will remain active in the business, with Don continuing on as chief executive officer and Janet as senior vice president, finance. 

When it comes to dental equipment, preventative maintenance is a must. Equipment must be properly cared for to keep instruments working at peak performance for as long as possible, but also you—as the health care provider—and your patient must be kept safe from infection. Through preventative maintenance tasks daily, weekly, monthly and annually, your dental practice lessens the chances of unexpected equipment failures resulting in downtime, as well as more importantly, safety concerns. 

As you know, managing a dental office and the necessary dental equipment maintenance tasks is often overwhelming. Our goal here is to simplify things in a short three-part blog series covering dental equipment preventative maintenance specific to sterilization, operatory, medical gas and IT tasks. 

What you need to know

On January 14, 2020 Microsoft will no longer offer any type of support for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 operating systems. 

As a dentist, you take pride in the work you do. Every day you help patients become healthier and more confident, and your practice is growing as a result.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t always mean that your practice is optimizing for profitability. In fact, without adequate attention to one critical step, it could mean the opposite; you could be burning cash even while producing more.

What is that critical step? Collections. One of the biggest challenges dentists face is simply getting paid for the work they’ve already completed.

In this article, we are going to look at 5 ways doctors can improve their collection efficiency and capture the financial success they’ve already earned.

Private dental practices are known for their patient-centered care. They strive to serve their community and keep people healthy. Many practices have begun to implement In-House Membership Plans as an alternative payment solution for patients.

Every doctor wants their practice to be financially successful, but striking a balance between providing excellent patient care and maximizing the profit of the business is not always easy to navigate.  For some dentists, being the CEO doesn’t come naturally and, as a result, they tend to focus more on the delivery of patient care. Having a busy office and full chairs often becomes the yardstick for measuring a practice’s business performance and they may not routinely look at numbers behind the numbers or for opportunities to improve.

Nothing is more fundamental to a business than finances and accounting. Unfortunately, private dental practices sometimes overlook these tasks for more urgent matters, like taking care of patients. After all, serving patients is the reason you are in business in the first place.

The truth is that every practice can benefit from better control over their books, but better accounting does not have to be complicated. For many dentists, profitability can be improved by simply getting paid for the work they have already done.

What has a 20% return on investment and is 95% automated? And also helps your patients move forward with the treatment they need?

In our last blog post, we discussed how equipment specialists play an important role in the dental office design project. However, their expertise is not just limited to equipment. Equipment specialists like Bart Miller lend a hand in nearly every aspect of the planning process.