Create a Hygiene Driven Practice

Transcript performed by A.I. Please excuse the typos.
00:00
Hello friends, welcome to your weekly Motivational Moments with Eric Vickery, President of Coaching at All-Star Dental Academy. And with me is my friend and fellow hygiene coach, Lynn. Hi Lynn. Hi there. All right, we’re doing back to back weeks here. We just talked about just what is a hygiene driven practice overall, and now this is the how-to. So what steps can we take in creating this hygiene driven practice that you’re

00:29
so passionate about? What would you say? Yeah, so if you remember last week, we shared what makes a hygiene-driven practice. Now, and the first thing we mentioned is vision. You want to be driven by your vision and articulated with your team, especially articulated with your hygiene team as that, and they’re part in that vision that they can go behind that vision and make it happen.

00:59
And then you have to make sure you inform everybody. So you’re, you’re doing the same thing, calibrate with everybody as far as, as your standard of care, you want to establish your standard of care and your treatment philosophy. It’s so sad when you, when you have somebody who, when your dentist says that, um, you know, you’re ready for, uh, hygiene, but the hygienist says, no, you don’t, you don’t need to, you know, patient go like, well,

01:29
calibration. You’re not talking this. I think we could spend, we could probably spend an hour of just being on the same page, not only philosophically, but just clinically on, even probing and measuring the health of the gums, right? You bet. And then what does a treatment plan look like and how do you present that? And are we watching things or all of that? So that’s a long topic to get into, but that’s definitely a meeting to get clear on.

01:57
Yeah. For another session, because it creates credibility for your practice. Okay. So the next thing you want to do is empower your hygienist. You see, your hygienists are trained to do certain procedures, and you want them to be able to do that, especially if your state allows it, like anesthetics, whitening, all those other procedures, the adjunct procedures that help with your production. And another thing I think is very important,

02:26
is to empower your hygienist to address your patient’s concern. And that way, before you come in, your hygienist already addressed that and your patient is ready to positively accept your case presentation. That is a big assistant for your hygiene team. I think with that, you know, your case acceptance should, you know, should skyrocket, you know. And I know I have some dentists who would love to have their hygienist be part of that.

02:56
So that’s empowering them. Yeah, I would just add to that. I’ve had some clients where I find out that sometimes the hygienist isn’t saying anything when the doctor comes in for the exam. Sometimes the hygienist isn’t even in the room. They’ve moved on to another room. And so this is a real, I think this is a real powerful point in that, hey, your hygienist has built rapport. She’s done diagnosis. She’s already talked to the patient about it. And when the doctor comes in, it can just simply be a confirmation that

03:23
Doctors in full support of what the hygienist is recommending, right? I know. And it’s like opening the door for you to say, yeah, like, okay, I’m here. I just confirmed the diagnosis and let’s go. I mean, that is a big help for the doctor. I think that’s a big thing that the hygiene team can help the doctor with. So aside from that, you want to execute systems, okay? These systems having that, again, it creates a standard.

03:51
and guide that provides consistency between providers is so important, right? So we’re just talking about calibration, right? So having a consistent standard of care will provide that for you. And again, your patient will give you credibility between the hygienist and the doctor. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So-

04:16
KPIs even with looking at different hygienists and one hygienist has got periopercentage here and one hygienist You know 30% 40% and the other hygienist might have 10 or 15 percent and there could be reasons for that, you know Standing hygienist might have lower. Yeah, but they’re gonna be on the same page Clinically. Yeah agreed. Okay, cool. Okay. What else? Okay, we’re talking about systems right? Guess what the

04:41
primary systems we have to employ in order to have rapport and engage with our patient is the Great Call. It starts with the Great Call. I think with the Great Call, you get a leg up on your relationship with your patient. So for those who have not dove into the Great Call process, that is an awesome system to have in your practice. These are some good points. I love it. Love it. So next thing you want to have are diagnostic tools.

05:08
What are the diagnostic tools you’re using? Um, I know some offices do sell very test, VelSco for oral cancer screening. Anyway, you want to calibrate with each other that you’re using it regularly or whatever your criteria is for using their diagnostic tools now, and then you want to create systems. Okay. Here’s important. You want to create systems that address, that address your standard of care and your treatment philosophy.

05:36
That way, everything is addressed, nothing false, nothing false off the cart. Because if we’re doing that- And that’s gonna take, yeah, you gotta communicate as a team, you’re gonna take team meeting time, you’re gonna collaborate, you’re gonna make sure you execute, and you talk about if it’s working or not. And if you’re not doing that, something’s probably missing, is that fair? Exactly, exactly. Because you wanna be saying the same things, doing the same things, so that the patient will go.

06:04
see one hygienist and they go, okay, well, she didn’t do this with me last time or she said something different last time. So what does that say about your practice? All right. Well, listen, this has been really good. There’s so much more to be said here. I know you want so much more. If you guys want more of this, reach out to Heather at AllS Ask about hygiene coaching with Lynn. She’s got a phenomenal systematic manual approach to…

06:33
growing your hygiene department. Thank you, Lynn, for joining us. I really appreciate it. It’s my pleasure, Eric. Thank you.