The Productive Dentist Podcast

Questions have come flooding in so I'm going to spend a little more time answering your questions. I know I've said this before, but I'm always happy to cover any topics of interest to you on this podcast, so please keep asking. Today, I answer these top listener questions: What is the ROI on lasers? How do you add blocks and not triple book? When you have an associate, how do you add to their pro...

My inbox has been flooded with numerous questions from doctors around the country. So today I'm going to answer the questions that keep popping up about scheduling. These came directly from our listeners and I'm always happy to answer any questions you might have about any of the topics I discuss on this podcast. Today I'll cover the following questions: What is the key to a steady schedule? What...

One of the hot topics right now is getting rid of PPOs. After all, with a PPO you're writing off 30-40% of your productivity to these big corporations. That's a big price tag for putting patients in your chairs. But what if you took that 30-40% and put the money to marketing toward fee-for-service patients who would support your practice goals? Now I'm not opposed to dentists signing up for PPOs;...

If you're anything like me, you get emails and letters that offer to get you massive amounts of new patients. It sounds good up front, but you end up with all these patients who aren't qualified for the work you want to do. As I learned in my own practice…marketing doesn't always work how you intend. So today I'm going to talk about a marketing lesson I learned and how PDA | Marketing Group helped...

It's great to have all the technology, but it will also put you out of business. My wife told me a long time ago that if I hadn't bought all this stuff that I probably would have been able to retire 20 years ago. One of my team members who handles all the ordering hates it when I go to a meeting and buy a new piece of equipment. Most of the time the equipment ends up on a shelf and when she asks m...

"Who needs coaches anyway?" Well, every all-star and championship winning sports player and team has a coach or group of coaches. So why do people who are so good at their sport need coaches? This is something that really bugs me about dentistry; we have a lot of groups and people talking on Facebook about "oh you can do it yourself, you don't need a coach." Let me tell you, over my 39 years of pr...

"Today's message is simple, be happy." I've talked before about the smiley face and the frowny face that my staff used to put up in the break room to let everyone know what mood I was in. That was a big realization moment for me that I needed to change the way I thought about how I presented myself to my team. Today we're going to talk about how you and your team should be in their happy place, so...

"We surveyed accounts receivable team members and 91% would rather hike 5 miles in the desert with no water or eat brussels sprouts 7 days a week than do collection calls." Today we're going to talk about something near and dear to every dentist's heart, accounts receivable. The truth is accounts receivable is not an easy thing to do in dentistry; the work has already been done and the patient may...

"The truth is, my life just really wasn't working at that point," says my special guest and practice partner, Dr. Jeff Buske. "I was taking the stress of things at work home to the people who loved me the most, and not giving them the best part of myself." Today, Dr. Buske and I chat more about that point that hit him between the eyes with his life and practice, what he did to get himself back on...

"Everybody at heart wants to be abundant and share and give to people, but I think their perception of where they are isn't true." Dr. Jeff Buske joins me again for a conversation about abundance and scarcity. Today's discussion dives into perceptions, what contributes to a mentality of scarcity or abundance vs. the reality of a situation, and how you and your thought processes can influence the a...

"I don't think any of us are necessarily broken, it's just that my priorities changed," says Dr. Jeff Buske, my practice partner of 15 years, who joins me for another podcast discussion today, this time to discuss the producer and the pretender in all of us. I think a lot of doctors get locked into working on patients, coming home, working on patients, and like Dr. Buske says, "When you have thing...

"I was at a point in 2004 where I was considering walking away from dentistry," says Dr. Jeff Buske, my good friend and practice partner for the past 15 years. Jeff was kind enough to join me for today's podcast to talk about abundancy and what led to the creation of Compassionate Finance. Today we talk about what sparked the idea that grew into Compassionate Finance and some real-life, practical...

"It's counterintuitive. It's 180 degrees from anything anyone has ever taught you." We've talked a little bit about what Compassionate Finance is and how it works, but there are many, many ways to use it in your office. Today, we're going to talk about how to utilize it and what some best practices are.

Patients want to see you for the work they need done. But what if they don't have insurance or just can't afford it? This is where Compassionate Finance comes in. Let me tell you something interesting, when offices stopped offering 3rd party financing and only gave patients two options – cash or monthly payments – cash payers went up by 39%. Today we're going to talk more in depth about how Compas...

Nine years ago, my practice partner Dr. Buske asked me, "Hey Bruce, do you think we could finance ortho?" That sparked a longer conversation about costs and interest and how to best serve the needs of our patients. I'd spent years telling doctors not to be the bank, but I wondered if there was a way to help our patients. Compassionate Finance was the result. Today we're going to talk about how in-...

There are some things in dentistry that we believe that are just not true. Today I'm going to cover a few myths in dentistry and what the reality of the situation is. Just a few of the topics will include the myths that access to care is a problem and you need large numbers of new patients to succeed. Listen in for more myths, and a few little secrets that could help your practice today.

The average bank account balance in America right now is $4,400 and the average credit card balance is $18,500. So what happens if you have a treatment plan that's up around $9-10,000? Well, right now the economy is pretty good, but what happens if it goes down? The reality is we have to find ways to make dentistry more affordable to patients. So today we're going to talk about financial options t...

I always tell doctors there are two kinds of people in this world: engineers and non-engineers. The engineer is the one who needs to have all the info before they make a decision; they're the ones who want to know the molecular makeup of the material you're going to use. The non-engineer needs to trust you. The truth is about 80% of dentists think like engineers, while about 80% of your patients d...

In part 1 of this two-part series, we talked about the process of how we go through an examination. How I do it is all new patients come through me first, and we see a 37% increase in productivity when I see the patient first as opposed to hygiene. It also keeps us on track with our schedule. Today we're going to talk about more best practices for handling new patient exam from what to look for, h...

We're all taught how to do an exam in dental school. But in my own practice, and at Productive Dentist Academy, we do things a bit differently than what they teach in school. As we get started on this two-part series about the new patient exam, I want you to remember something that I've said many times before on this podcast: you as a dentist are not responsible for your patient's issues. Let's ho...

I get a lot of emails promoting the newest product or technique. I'm sure you have the same thing in your inbox, too. So how do we sort the contenders from the pretenders? I think its common sense to say don't take everything you hear as gospel. I know I've certainly made a few mistakes over the years, but I've learned a thing or two. Now don't get me wrong, there are some really good new things o...

Today I'm going to talk about something that hit me between the eyes. It doesn't really matter how old you are – 20, 30, 60, 70 – it can happen anytime in our career. I lost one of my best friends this year and I found that I started feeling old. This is what can happen anytime: you get old, you feel that you've reached the pinnacle of your career. So I started thinking about the dentists I know w...

I've been getting questions from doctors all over the country about the Netflix documentary "Root Cause" that follows the experiences of one person's experience with root canal treatment and the alleged systemic issues he claims are associated with root canal treatment.  Let me just say that my opinions have been shaped over the past 39 years of practicing dentistry, I hope we all never stop learn...

Another one of the risk factors I've added to my arsenal is psychological or psycho risk. What's important for you to understand as a dentist is that some of your patients are psycho. And I like to find out who those patients are before I do a treatment plan. These are the patients who bring in a bag of 30 sets of dentures, show up every day for a month, always have something negative to say about...

Dr. John Kois lists 4 risk factors which we've already covered, but over the years I've added a few. One is physiologic risk. I see a lot of people with sleep apnea, allergies, and other seemingly non-dental issues and I've come to consider them as physiologic risks. I highly suggest you get training in sleep apnea and go to a course and get educated in this area, it could make a big difference to...