ResiDental Movement

E25: Does Every Patient Need Comp Care?

Did you know that I love when you reach out with questions?! You can always reach me at hello@residentalmovement.com or DM residentalmovement on Instagram with questions.
This week’s episode is a response to a listener's question that I’m excited to discuss with you! They asked, “Does every patient need comp care?” After discussing this more with the listener, we decided the more specific question he meant to ask was “Do you only offer comp care in your dental house call practice?” So, I’m going to answer both the original question AND the question that he meant to ask today.
The listener who asked this question is a chairside dentist who is strongly considering offering house calls. This listener may be at the same stage in their house call journey as you, so I hope you can benefit from this information, too. I believe that comprehensive care is essential for most dental patients. When I provide in-home dental care through my practice, AccommoDental, I always start with a comprehensive oral exam and develop a treatment plan based on the patient's needs. I also make sure to see my patients regularly for re-care visits.
However, I also recognize that not all patients are able or willing to pursue comprehensive care. Some may only have a specific issue that they need addressed, such as a broken tooth or abscess. For these patients, I offer limited exams and treatment plans to help them feel more comfortable. Ultimately, I believe that we need to take a patient-centered approach to dental care and consider each individual's unique circumstances. This may mean deviating from the ideal treatment plan in certain cases, such as when a patient is nearing the end of their life.
If you're interested in supporting patients who struggle to afford in-home care, I encourage you to check out the Home Smile Care Foundation, a nonprofit organization that I co-founded with my loved ones. Thank you for taking the time to read or listen to my thoughts on comprehensive dental care. I hope this information is helpful to you!
 
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E24: Your Words Matter

Today we're covering the importance of language in healthcare, specifically for house call dentistry. As a dentist, I believe that the way we communicate with our patients is crucial in demonstrating respect and empathy towards them. In this episode, I'll be discussing two areas of communication that I feel strongly about - people-first language and elderspeak.
People-first language is all about referring to a person's disability as a noun, rather than using it as an adjective. For example, instead of saying "my autistic patient," we should say "my patient with autism." This shows that the disability is just one aspect of the person, rather than defining them entirely. It's also important to avoid using outdated terms like "handicapped" or "retarded," which are now considered offensive.
Elderspeak is another area of communication that we should avoid at all costs. This refers to speaking to older adults in a condescending way, assuming that they are incompetent or have a disability. For example, using inappropriate greetings or phrases like "sweetheart" or "hunny," or speaking to them like children. We should treat older adults with the respect they deserve and avoid using terms like "geriatric" or "senior citizen," which can be offensive.
Finally, we should also be mindful of the words we use to describe healthcare facilities. Instead of using terms like "nursing home" or "clinic," we should refer to them as "communities" or "health centers." This shows that these facilities are places where people can come together and receive care, rather than just clinical settings.
The way we choose to speak is very telling and can demonstrate our values. By using people-first language, avoiding elderspeak, and being mindful of the words we use to describe healthcare facilities, we can show respect and empathy towards our patients and their families. Let's strive to communicate in a way that empowers and uplifts those around us. Thank you for listening I hope this episode is both helpful and encouraging. If you have any questions or thoughts, please feel free to reach out at hello@residentalmovement.com.
 
Visit me at: ResiDENTAL Movement Website
 
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E23: Why I Started a Fee-For-Service House Call Practice

When starting this podcast & blog I wanted to share my experience of becoming a dentist and how I decided to leave public health to pursue fee-for-service practice ownership with my dental house call service, AccommoDental. I hope this will encourage you to start a fee for service house call practice, too! My goal has always been to address access to care, especially for patients who struggle for access. Initially, I associated fee-for-service practices with greed and a lack of access. However, as I gained experience, I realized that the fee-for-service model is the only way to provide my patients access to quality care in their homes.
I started AccommoDental because I wanted to provide dental house calls to people who could not physically get to the dental office. However, the public health facilities where I worked were not in a financial position to be able to compensate me to leave and spend over an hour with just ONE patient in their home. So, I knew that if dental house calls were going to become available in my community, I was going to have to start my own business.
I recommend that when you start your dental house call practice, you start a fee-for-service house call practice and set your own fees. This model allows dentists to be adequately compensated for not only the services they provide at each visit but also for the time outside of every visit that is required to pack equipment, drive to someone’s home, write notes, order meds, make referrals and all of the other behind-the-scenes work that patients don’t witness.
I understand that you might have a hard time following through on my recommendation if you always thought of fee-for-service practices as icky, however, there are things you can do to make your practice accommodating for people who do have insurance. You can offer to submit claims for them and collect full payment but then submit insurance claims as a courtesy to the patient.
Lastly, I also have a heart for people who cannot afford dental care, especially dental house calls. This is why my family and I founded the Home Smile Care Foundation. It’s a nonprofit organization founded to provide financial assistance to those in need of dental home care but cannot afford it.
I hope this episode was helpful and encouraging. If you have any questions or thoughts, please feel free to reach out at hello@residentalmovement.com.
 
Visit me at: ResiDENTAL Movement Website
 
Visit Home Smile Care Foundation
 
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E22: My Thoughts on the SCDA Meeting

Today I’m excited to share some of my thoughts and experiences at the Special Care Dental Association, or SCDA, annual meeting. SCDA is a unique international organization of oral health professionals and other individuals who are dedicated to promoting oral health and wellbeing for people with special needs. SCDA is proud to bring together professionals from the American Association of Hospital Dentists (AAHD), the Academy of Dentistry for Persons with Disabilities (ADPD) and the American Society for Geriatric Dentistry (ASGD).
Because many of the goals and activities of these three practice areas overlap, the component groups joined forces and formed SCDA. By fully integrating these groups, SCDA benefits its members – and the patients they serve – by having a united leadership and a single mission. Members include dentists, dental hygienists and assistants, non-dental healthcare providers, health program administrators, residents, students and hospitals.
SCDA is a relatively small dental organization of dentists who reach underserved patient populations. Generally, member dentists fall into one of these three categories: dentists who treat patients in a hospital setting, dentists who treat patients with special needs, or dentists who treat older adults. If you’re interested in offering dental house calls, you’re probably interested in offering “special care” to patients and SCDA could be the perfect group for you to join. Lecture topics included subjects that we’ve discussed before like, how to serve dying patients, and many that we haven’t, like the many changes in Medicare and what that means for patients. 
Lectures and presentations were very formal due to the fact that a significant number of people presenting were academics. This style can be a turn off for some, and preferred by others but for me, the CE topics were the standout, as it’s a subject that other conferences tend to overlook– so I was okay sitting through more formal presentations. In addition to the CE, I loved being in the company of dentists on a mission to serve underserved populations.  At this conference, I felt like I was with my people. In the past, I’ve shared with you that it’s easy to feel siloed or misunderstood when you’re the only house call dentist in town, so I appreciated being in the company of people who understood my work. There were even other house call dentists there that I got to catch up with, like Dr. Joy Poskozim who you heard from in episode #18.  
Speaking of being with “my people,” at this meeting, I had the amazing opportunity to FINALLY meet my virtual assistant, Katie! In episode #11, you met Jenn St. Pierre from My Remote Dental Assistant. That service matched me and Katie almost two years ago! Katie is great to my patients, she’s hard-working, but most-importantly, she really believes in the mission of AccommoDental, my dental home care service. 
One critique I have of SCDA is that it’s a pretty top-heavy organization. It seemed like most of the attendees were involved in leadership one way or another. Selfishly, this made attending the meeting wonderful, because leadership was so accessible to attendees. It was awesome to interact directly with leaders in this space and to be able to ask them questions about their experience treating different patient populations. Still, I do worry about the long-term growth and sustainability of this very important organization if it remains small and mostly includes leadership, so definitely join and attend for some CE and camaraderie. 
Thanks for tuning in to hear about my experience at the SCDA annual meeting. I always want to keep you in the loop about everything and anything that could be helpful to you as you begin offering in-home dental care for patients. If you have any questions, you can always reach out to me directly at hello@residentalmovement.com. If you’re struggling to envision what your day to day life would look like as a house call dentist, visit residentalmovement.com/adayinthelife for my FREE Scheduling Template called “A Day in the Life of a House Call Dentist.” 
Whether you decide to pursue dental home care or not, consider supporting those in need of it by contributing to the Home Smile Care Foundation. This is a nonprofit organization founded by myself and my loved ones to offer financial assistance to patients who struggle to afford in-home care. Visit homesmilecarefoundation.org for more information.
 
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E21: Who Are You Trying to Serve?

Today I’m sharing my experience sitting on a panel for an event hosted by my local dental society “The Business Side of Dentistry” for new dentists. The event was aimed at dentists who are less than 10 years out of school, and that includes me. It was great to see a variety of experience levels represented in the group. The majority were unlicensed dental residents who were about to launch their careers!
As a presenter at the event, I shared my dental home care practice model, AccommoDental, and encouraged new dentists to embrace in-home dental care. I was thrilled to see that my presentation sparked a lot of interest and generated many questions from residents and dentists who own brick and mortar practices. If you’ve listened to this podcast before, you know my practice has a completely different business model from the other startups or acquisitions that these new dentists have learned about before. Check out episode #3 about a blue ocean to learn more.
Two questions, in particular, stood out to me: why don’t I offer luxury in-home services and why don’t I have a mobile van? The answer to both questions is simple: my mission is to provide care to patients who are best-served at home. My patient pool is composed of patients with special needs, older adults, patients with dental anxiety, patients with autoimmune disorders, and patients with neurological and neurodegenerative disorders. These patients don’t typically demand veneers or luxurious dental care because they’re most concerned with health and comfort. Additionally, many of them cannot physically get into a van.
While mobile dental van models are more efficient than my home care model and a concierge luxury practice is likely more lucrative than my practice, I am clear on the patients I’m trying to serve. You need to be clear on WHO you are interested in serving before you start any practice. Dentistry is a health service, and every single person on the planet needs it. No single dentist can treat every person on earth in the best way. This is why we have many dentists and specialists who practice in different ways. Variety and freedom allow ALL patients to be served.
I recommend that you check out episode 13 with Dr. Miles and episode 15 with Dr. Amaro, because these mobile dentists do their own thing their own way and it’s great!
If you’re considering offering at-home dental services to patients who cannot get to the dentist, I highly recommend exploring all of the great dental business ideas out there. Offering house calls isn’t only wonderful for these patients, it can offer a lot of value and flexibility to your life, too. Check out my FREE scheduling template “A Day in the Life of a House Call Dentist” to envision what your days could look like if you embraced this model.
Lastly, whether you decide to pursue dental home care or not, please consider supporting those in need of it by contributing to the Home Smile Care Foundation, a nonprofit organization founded by myself and my loved ones to offer financial assistance to patients who struggle to afford in-home care.
Thank you for taking the time to tune into episode 21 today. I hope that my experience has inspired you to consider offering at-home dental care for the patients who need it. Remember, every little bit helps!
 
Visit me at: ResiDENTAL Movement Website
 
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E20: Tax Write-Offs for House Call Dentists

Get your Quickbooks Discount
FREE Scheduling Template: A Day in the Life of a House Call Dentist
 
ResiDENTAL Movement Website
Home Smile Care Foundation Website

E19: Be Prepared

ResiDENTAL Movement
Home Smile Care Foundation
AccommoDental

E18: Caring for Patients in Hospice Care with Dr. Joy Poskozim

Dr. Joy's website 
ResiDENTAL Movement
Home Smile Care Foundation 
AccommoDental
 

E17: My thoughts after the National Mobile and Teledentistry Conference

National Mobile and Teledentistry Conference
American Mobile and Teledentistry Alliance
Sound Dental Care
Smiles Across Montana
Sonya Dunbar 
Melissa Turner
 
ResiDENTAL Movement
Home Smile Care Foundation
AccommoDental

E16: Should You Do House Calls Part-Time or Full-Time?

Check out the FREE scheduling template called "A Day in the Life of a House Call Dentist." 
Visit HomeSmileCareFoundation.org