Keeping up with what is going on in a growing practice is hard. It only gets harder the bigger you grow and the longer you’re in practice. We have talked about many things that bog down an orthodontic practice so I thought I’d share a list of reports you should be running regularly to enhance production/profit if you own a practice and definitely should run before you buy a practice. They may be called different things in different software but the basic idea is the same and you can ask your support people for help. This list is certainly not all inclusive but it may point out a few things you’re missing.

  • Active patients without a future appointment – get em in, get em done!
  • Active patients beyond estimated treatment time – overtime is a killer. Get them done!
  • Active patients with a zero balance – this is just another way to find the patients that are overtime. Some on this report will be paid in full but most will be overtime.
  • Observation/recall patients without a future appointment – you cannot afford to let these folks disappear. Get them in!
  • New patients who did not show for their appointment – get them in!
  • Bond appointments that did not show – get them in!
  • Current list of patients who completed phase I treatment but no phase II – you need to look at each of these and follow up since most need phase II and there is no reason they shouldn’t do that in your practice.
  • Pending/recall patients – the new patients who show but didn’t start. TCs will resist doing recall but it must be done.
  • Run AR aging (collections) reports daily to see who you need to talk to tomorrow at their appointment (who is coming in for an appointment – address in the morning meeting) and look at “30 days past due” so you can see the ones who are definitely behind and need to be contacted. Need to have everyone on autodraft of course.
  • Run a report called “suspicious balances” it’s called this on Orthotrac and Dolphin to find weird stuff

This is not a complete list but it’s a different take on the reporting game. Let me know if you have any other favorites and what you find when you run these. Have a great week.