It’s the time of year when viruses attack your health, software and finances.
Here’s how to start the year off right.
This article will deal with the three types of “flu bugs” that can affect your office productivity and effectiveness this time of the year:
- The actual flu bug viruses floating around your home and work space;
- The computer viruses constantly springing up on the Internet, and potentially on your office software; and
- The “holiday flu season” consumers (and your dental patients) encounter about 30 days after the holidays when the first credit card payments come due.
Protect your staff
Early in the fall, flu vaccine manufacturers estimate what flu viruses will be most prevalent around the world and incorporate them into safe flu vaccines, both in injectable and, more recently, flu mist form to be administered to all who can safely get it.
The entire staff should be encouraged to get flu vaccines, regardless of how much time they spend chair-side in the practice since all staff members come in contact with practically all the patients during the flu season. Not only will it help to keep your staff healthy, but it can also prevent staff members from potentially passing on their flu virus to patients and vice versa. Health care providers in large institutions such as hospitals, military facilities, and nursing homes often have a mandatory vaccination policy to prevent that from happening, and your office should strive for that goal also.
Children are phenomenal spreaders of the flu viruses due to close contact in school settings, and their viruses can be spread to adult family members. These viruses seem to more virulently affect adults and elderly. And, with the amount of traveling young families do around the holiday season, they quickly spread different virus strains around globe and into your office. Regardless of the age group of your patients, the flu knows no boundaries, so protect your staff and patients now.
Protect your records
The second kind of viruses is the one that infects your computer operating system or Internet access, and the start of a new year is a good time to renew your antivirus software. Most companies such as Symantec®, AVG®, and Zone Alarm® start the year off with a new version, so this is a good time to renew your subscription or download recent updates.
Many antivirus software systems come in “user packages” depending on how many workstations you have. This is not a place you want to skimp on the budget, due to the potential havoc it can cause with your office data. If you have a local information technology person who supports your hardware, this also is a good time to have him or her check your system for security and other potential hardware glitches, as well as any upgrades to your operating system or other peripheral equipment. A yearly review of your equipment purchases with your accountant is a good step in the right direction. Accounting software vendors such as QuickBooks® usually start the year with improvements. A quick check with your accountant can let you know if it is worth the cost of upgrading this year.
You should also review the security level of each staff member. Only you should have access to the audit trail report that should be run at the end of the year (quarterly is better, but make sure to run it once a year) to detect potential embezzlement going on without your knowledge. Focus on adjustments to the patient accounts; prescription writing; and, if you take insurance assignment, adjustments made by staff members delegated to that task. Your dental software support staff can help you with any questions you may have in running a proper audit trail report and how to protect yourself from practice embezzlement, which is reported to be occurring in as many as 40 percent of dental offices nationwide.
Protect your finances
The third area deals with the inevitable post-Christmas “flu bug” that your patients undergo if they have excessively spent during the gift buying season. The post-Christmas period competes with the back-to-school season as one of the slowest times in the office, when patients tend to postpone elective dental treatment as they tighten their budgets. New deductibles and co-pays also start with the beginning of a new year, translating into more out of pocket expenses for the patient.
Your staff members themselves are not “immune” to that virus also, and your office needs a clear and consistent policy on when performance and salary reviews are conducted during the year. It is highly recommended to separate those two tasks: salary review should be linked to when you increase your fees so staff members understand that their pay increases are linked to practice profitability, not to longevity.
Most dental offices should be raising fees in the 5 percent range this year, due to rising costs of providing benefits and increases across the board by practically every vendor with whom you do business. Patients respond much better to small, consistent fee increases than large ones coming all in one year. Staff members should be trained in explaining why fees are increasing and shouldn’t be embarrassed to tell patients that fee increases are necessary to maintain the quality of service the practice provides.
Before increasing fees, purchase a current dental fee survey to ensure that your fees reflect the percentile you feel your practice warrants, as opposed to a haphazard method of raising fees without regard to what your peers charge for the same procedure.
Taking the time to follow these simple steps will help your office to ward off the “holiday blues and flus” and energize staff members as you enter the new year, with all its challenges and potential.