How do you talk to patients about money and the cost of dental services during a global pandemic and economic uncertainty?

There’s a right way to do it – to preserve the patient relationship and to ensure you receive compensation for the dentistry you produce.

Among the many challenges experienced during the COVID pandemic, your dental organization’s collections or case acceptance are likely a few of them. Dentistry is a business of people, and people are naturally inclined to shy away from talking about money during challenging times.

Every person has been impacted by COVID in one way or another and it’s hard for team members to put that thought aside when asking patients for money.

But, if we re-frame our perspective and remember that talking about money is truly about finding a solution to the dental care our patients need, it becomes a whole lot easier.

First, we must remember that empathy is crucial in all aspects of patient care, and vital to discussing financial arrangements with patients.

The most successful financial coordinators listen carefully to what the patient is saying and seek to understand rather than to respond. Being a good listener requires full attention, body language, and an openness to hear what someone says.

Our responses to patients should be empathetic in nature and personalized with the patient’s name whenever possible. It’s also important that we don’t use statements like ‘I understand’, if we truly don’t understand what the patient is going through. Patients can see through fake empathy – try ‘I can imagine what that might feel like’ instead.  

As Dental Group Advisors, we have heard real feedback to support what the statistics are showing – people are still spending money, even during these challenging times.

Whether from stimulus checks, increased federal unemployment dollars or another reason, the American population is spending, so why wouldn’t they spend it on the dental care we know they need? This may not be true for every patient that walks through our doors, but that’s not for us to speculate or assume. Consistent approaches to financial arrangements will prove successful when we avoid making assumptions about a patient’s ability to afford treatment.

Yes, we should be empathetic to their situation, but that means being thoughtful about our approach to the conversation and leaving it to the patient to decide.

Financial conversations should include a great deal of questions on our part, to understand our patient’s obstacles. What a patient may present as a financial obstacle may not truly be the case.

It’s easy to say it’s about money, especially at a time like this. However, we’ve found that there is usually another concern lying below that waiting to be uncovered. It may be they don’t see the value in the treatment which isn’t exactly a financial concern.

Ask yourself if you’ve done everything possible to help the patient understand their problem, what the consequences are to not solving that problem, potential benefits from solving the problem, and what treatment solution you recommend. A financial arrangement is nothing more than helping the patient to find the solution to their dental care needs.

Don’t let the pandemic change what you know to be true about dental needs.