Boost Your Value as a Hygienist with 4 simple steps

8/4/2016 3:05:04 PM   |   Comments: 0   |   Views: 479

How to Become an Irreplaceable Hygienist?

Let's be honest, we all want to be irreplaceable. The question is, what can a hygienist do to become so valuable that the dentist would not dare replace them? If your lucky, it might just get you a raise at the same time. You might be wondering why you should trust my opinion in the first place. The answer is quite simple. First, I own a dental practice in Idaho Falls called Oxford Dental Care so I know a little bit about how dentists think, and second, I have consulted with over 70 dentists personally, so again, I know a thing or two about how dentists think. So how are you going to become irreplaceable?

To answer this question, let's talk about the two things that are always on a dentists mind:

1. More patients

2. More patients

Good, so now that we are clear about that, what can you do about it?


To find out more about Oxford Dental Care, you can check us out on Google+

Keep Patients in the Practice

The first way that you can help the practice see more patients is by keeping them in the practice. Based on large amounts of data that I have personally analyzed from over 70 practices, there are four steps that you can take when reappointing to be among the elite reappointers.

1. Compliment: Give your patients a compliment on something oral health related before you attempt to get them reappointed. Have you ever heard the phrase success breeds success? When you tell your patients something that they are being successful at regarding their oral health, they subconsciously gain a desire to want to see more success in that area... Cue reappointing conversation.

2. Do it yourself: You are the expert at dental hygiene, so you should be the one telling the patient when they need to be seen again. Your patients will respond better to you than to anyone else when it comes to reappointing for hygiene visits.

3. Make it a statement: NEVER ask a patient if they want to schedule their next hygiene visit. Why wouldn't they? You are awesome right? It is important right? Instead, make a statement. Say, "let's get you scheduled for your hygiene visit six months from now".

4. Use herd mentality: People have a lot of decisions to make in a day and we use habits or the decisions of others to help make the decision making process easier. This is where the idea of herd mentality comes from. Tell your patients what "most people" like to do. For example: "most people like to schedule their six month appointments so that they don't have to try to remember when it has been six months. You already have so many other things to remember. Let's go ahead and get you scheduled and we will give you a reminder when your appointment is getting closer".

Do these things and you will very rarely have people say no to reappointing. Congratulations! You are now even more valuable to the dentist than you were before. Practically irreplaceable!

In my next article I will talk about how you can help bring in new patients which is the other piece of the puzzle that will make you irreplaceable, and hopefully get you a raise!
Irreplacable Dental Hygienist



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Sally Gross, Member Services Specialist
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Email: sally@farranmedia.com
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