 Hello everybody, Andrea here with Dental L. So how do new patient exams work when you're billing out as a dental hygienist with your own practice versus working in a dental office? So I'm going to run through this and basically three strong things that you have to think about. So when I was working in a dental office, sometimes the dentist would do the new patient exam. Sometimes I would see the patient in my chair and I would be doing the new patient exam. And then we would be billing out a little over $100 for that new patient exam. And patients would go, what was I paying for? But I find in a dental office, they just accept it. When they get this expensive bill from the dentist, they accept it. But me having my own dental hygiene practice, patients do ask more questions. And even when I first started my practice, I kind of thought, you know, are patients going to pay me the same? What's going on? I'm not working for a dentist. Are they expecting a dentist? So let me squash that for you, okay? Dental hygienists, we are all about prevention. We should be paid for our skills. Dentists have no problem charging an arm and a leg for certain things, right? As they should, because they went to school for a million years, they paid a lot of money to go to school and they are experts in what they do. Dental hygienists, we are experts in what we do based on prevention and oral health, the oral cavity. Personally, I wouldn't say your dentist is an expert on the oral cavity, your mouth. I would say the dental hygienists is. Dentists are experts on fixing problems. So when you have a cavity, what do you do? When you chip a tooth, what do you do? Crowns, bridges, composites, and Malcolm, dental hygienists, we are on prevention, the oral cavity, we are here for you to keep your teeth for life and to make your mouth as healthy as possible. So that's what a new patient exam is all about. We go through every single tooth. We go through what is on that tooth. It could be a composite, a melgum, a crown, a bridge. We look at that tooth like one tooth, okay? We're not just looking in the mouth for two seconds and being like, okay, Dan, you have five cavities. We look at every single tooth. We look at, oh, could this tooth potentially get a cavity because there's thinner enamel on this tooth but not the other ones? This patient here is clenching at nighttime. There's a lot of wear on the teeth, especially this tooth. Okay, next tooth. This tooth looks pretty good. Let's move on to the next one. Oh, this one has gingival recession. So we go through every single tooth. It doesn't happen in two seconds. So I bill for a new patient exam and patients don't have a problem with it because they can hear me talk about what they have in the mouth plus I'm going to take photos. So I can't take X-rays as a mobile dental hygienist but I can take intraoral photos. So I will show the patient those pictures that I'm taking inside their mouth. I will take my laptop. I'm just gonna use my iPad here and I'm going to show them their teeth. And I'm going to say, do you remember when I was calling out the tooth number three, six? And I said, there's a watch area. There might be a cavity. See this black spot here? So it's kind of nice to show them that. So again, you're not just looking in the mouth for two seconds. You're looking at every single tooth. So charge for that new patient exam. And if you are a dental hygienist watching this, let your patients know if they have questions. Like, well, why am I paying a little over $100 for my new patient exam? Like what are you doing that's so special? That's a fair question. But let them know that's just the feet for the new patient exam. And this is what you are doing. You are going through every single tooth to say exactly what they have. You are going to talk to them about tooth brushing, all of that specific to their needs. You are going to show them how to brush their teeth to limit plaque, tartar, any sort of issues with their teeth because there is such a thing as brushing too hard and brushing the wrong way and then causing damage that you can't fix. So the dental hygienist helps with that. Show them the inter-oral photos and say, I took pictures of every single tooth. That takes time. Talk to them about what they're eating, how much sugar are they getting? Talk to them about acid attacks in the mouth. Let them know every cup of coffee they have, well, that can bring the pH levels down to like 2.3. To cause a cavity, you only need a 5.5. That might sound confusing to a lot of people. So have on your iPad, laptop, whatever the pH scale from the acidic to the basic. Show them that I am going to teach you how to never get a cavity again. I'm going to teach you how to never get a cavity again. Did you hear me? And get excited about it, right? Patients will pay for that as they should. If you went to your hairstylist and they're going to teach you how to keep that amazing new hair color for six months, I'm just picking out a number here. You're going to listen, right? Like that's pretty awesome. You are going to go to that hairstylist versus the one that you're like in and out a couple hours, she says, he or she says, okay, see in like four weeks, bye. You're going to go to the other one. Sure, it might cost a bit more, but you're saving money in the long run because your hair is going to be healthier. It's going to look better. It's the same thing for the mouth. So definitely do that. So explain to patients why you are doing it. Speaking about insurance for dental offices, it's very easy for them to send everything through. It's even easy for them to get an estimate from the patient's insurance to see if it's covered. For independent dental hygienists, insurance companies, not all of them still recognize us as having our own practice. So they don't always let us send an estimate electronically, meaning we might not know whether the patient is covered or not. It's not going to tell us. If we worked in a dental office, it would tell us right away, easy peasy. But for us, I put the onus on my patients. I say, if you are concerned about coverage, it takes a little bit of time. Call your insurance company and ask them if you are covered for a new patient exam, they will let you know and then we will go from there. So don't just have a quick look inside the mouth for two seconds. Have a thorough look. For me to do a new patient exam, it does take about an hour and a half, maybe an hour and 15 minutes, depending on what they have inside the mouth. But it does take me time for, and that includes a cleaning too. So I should mention that, that does include a cleaning. I might not be able to finish the cleaning, depending on how much plaque or tartar they have, depending if it's been more than two years since they had their teeth cleaned, but it doesn't just take me 10 minutes. So do the work and charge for it, okay? If you guys have any questions, let me know. I talk more about this inside my course, Mobile RDH Academy. So if you are a dental hygienist starting your own practice, you need that course because I'm going to walk you through it even more step by step, how I go through my new patient exams, how I talk to patients, exactly what I say, so they will accept the new patient exam as a treatment, what I do exactly and exactly the fee that I charge. And again, how I go through insurance, how I submit it to insurance electronically or by mail for some of them, how I do all of that. So I go through step by step with you if you're not familiar with the whole process. So I will leave the link for you guys down below, the Mobile RDH Academy. You can sign up anytime. It is learned at your own pace. So thank you guys for watching and let me know if you have any questions.