Improving Productivity in Hygiene
by Susan K. Uglem, Ph.D. (with L. Hurston Anderson, Ph.D.)The Hygiene Department in a General, Periodontal, and Pediatric dental office drives the revenue. This book is written to help establish an effective hygiene protocol involving each and every member of the dental team with the objective of documenting and sustaining a Hygiene Department, which will be able to produce at least $1,000 per hygienist per day. The Table of Contents is below.
Page #’s
I. 2 How to use this book
II. 3-12 Your Hygiene PROTOCOL
III. 13-23 The Dental Practice as a Business
IV. 24-25 Why a Hygiene Protocol?
V. 26-27 Creating a Customized Hygiene Protocol
VI. 28-30 What is your Hygiene Philosophy?
VII. 31-33 The Hygiene Department-a separate business
VIII. 34-39 Goal Setting
IX. 40-43 Proposed Recare Procedure
X. 44-53 The other Professional in the practice-Hygienist
XI. 54-59 Scheduling Hints
XII. 60-64 Finding Patients from Patients of Record
XIII. 65-70 Encouraging Treatment (with reluctant patients)
XIV. 71-75 Record Keeping Sample Forms
XV. 76-88 Sample Insurance Codes and Narratives
How to use this book
The purpose of the book is to provide basic information and generalized criteria so that the dentist and his team may create their own Hygiene Protocol for their practice. The dentist/owner is certainly the primary contributor to the effort, but each and every member of the team must be involved for the practice’s Hygiene Protocol for it to be effective. Obviously, the hygienist(s) make an enormous contribution, but Assistants, Administrative staff, etc. also must contribute, agree and follow the Hygiene Protocol for it to succeed.
When the Hygiene Protocol is established for a practice it must be written, discussed in detail (suggest off premise meeting including role playing), and “bought into” by the entire team. Because each and every member of the team plays a key role their Job Descriptions must be updated to include their involvement. All areas of overlapping responsibility must be clarified and discussed amongst the individuals involved. Also, the dentist must be certain that there are no gaps in responsibility. If no one is assigned to a particular activity, it will either be an area of potential conflict, or it will be left undone.
There are ten blank pages provided immediately after this page. An effective method of using this book is to fill the blank forms with your customized Hygiene Protocol. After completing your Hygiene Protocol have it typed on 8.5 x 11 inch paper with a 1.5 inch left hand margin, 2 inches at the top, and 1 inch margins elsewhere. Carefully, remove the blank pages and forms and photocopy your customized versions onto the pages. Then carefully replace them.