 Hello, everybody. Andrew Maesky here with Dental L. Please excuse me. I have been sick all week. I look horrible. I have no energy still. I'm still sick actually, but I wanted to hop on to do some videos because I have time. I have canceled my patients for this week. I'm not doing much, but sitting in bed resting, hoping to get better sooner rather than later. But I wanted to come on to talk to you guys about the pros and cons of having, see I'm starting to lose my voice again, I'm sorry, of having your own dental hygiene business. Another thing that I want to apologize for is my lighting. I need to get curtains that block out the sunlight because yes, it does look amazing. On video, it does not. So I apologize again. Okay, no more apologies. Let's talk about pros and cons of having your own dental hygiene business. One con is yes, people usually start with pros. I'm going to start with the con is it's a lot more work than you think. If you think, okay, this will be awesome. I can work my own hours. I can work 10 till two. That's it. I guarantee you, you'll be working nine till five, just simply catching up on your notes, your charting, your organizing, your paperwork, your accounting, your insurance, all of that. Okay, mind you, I would not change a thing because before I did accept insurance, things were a lot easier when I was doing a cash, a cash only it was easier. Why was it easier because I had a lot less patience. I was maybe seeing a patient a week cash only awesome I had tons of time because there's not a lot of notes you have to do accounting will one person per week that's pretty easy. I would not change a thing. So that's kind of a pro. So you heard the con now I'm going to talk about a pro a pro to that con is it's a great problem to have the more patience you have the more work you are going to do, but you can hire somebody, hire somebody to be your dental patient, hire somebody to send all of those claims for you through to insurance, hire somebody to call insurance companies to see what the patient's coverage is so you don't have to hire somebody to do the accounting, hire somebody to do everything Okay, but the, but the charting, you know, the paperwork, yes, but the charting you obviously have to do that because you're the provider so you have to enter in the treatment notes, but you can hire somebody. Have I hired somebody. No, because I'm a control freak and until I find somebody like me, I will probably never have anybody work for me because I really have I have told people this for years. You don't want to work for me because I'm very, very picky because I have very high expectations of myself. I'm going to have high expectations for you to, but we're not talking about me. Okay. So another pro is you can set your own hours, you can set your own schedule. That's amazing. You no longer have to take holidays when your dental office takes holidays. You no longer have to feel bad when your office says oh can you stay an extra two hours because you don't need patients or the schedule kind of fell apart today. So you don't have to come in. It's nice to set your own schedule. If your schedule falls apart. Well, that's your own problem right you're not booking patients. If you want to take a day off take a day off if you're sick for a week like me, you don't have to feel bad calling and sick because you're your own person. Okay, so that's a pro. A con to that is if you don't work, you don't get paid. I've been sick for the whole week where it's nice to be able to take that time. I'm not getting paid you guys. My husband doesn't have a job right now because he got let go. We're just letting a lot of people go so there's no income coming in, you know, so that's kind of where that con stands if you have your own business there's no income coming in if you don't work. Okay, but just make sure to save up for that I save. I save money. I'm I'm that person where I plan for the future so we are fine I have saved money for the event that I'm going to get sick. Okay. So another con it was kind of a prone kind of a con but a con is that if you are going to deal with insurance company so if you are if you are going to accept assignment, meaning the patient pays you the difference not paid by insurance so they don't pay you the full amount for treatment. They just pay you the difference. If you are going to accept that it's a lot of work. You will likely have to chase down patients when it's like oh so insurance didn't pay this in this you owe another $50 or $30 you will likely have to chase down those patients to pay you. That's a con for sure but a pro to that is at least in my own practice before I started accepting insurance based clients I didn't get nearly as many patients I am seeing patients every day now. Two to three a day because I travel to homes to clean people's teeth but I do also see people in my home office to but I see about two or three a day. Whereas before I was maybe seen one a week before I accepted insurance. So it's a lot of work. I spend a lot of time doing paperwork but I get paid more because of it I get to see patients happy patients they love it when people accept insurance right away. So that they only have to pay the difference happy patients means they tell more people you get more patients because with any business if you're not bringing patients in. Yes you have patients you might have 10 patients. But if you're not constantly bringing in more patients. How often can you see those 10 patients typically twice a year right that's not going to be enough to have your own business so there you go. Another pro would just be it's exciting to be able to do your own thing you can do your own thing you can do whatever you want. You can talk to patients how you want to talk to patients. You can bill how you want to bill going by of course the fee guide. You don't have to answer to any to anybody else but according to that is it's a lot of work because you have to put together your your office policies the office infection control manuals. You have to do all of that whereas if you've just worked for somebody in a dental office before you've probably never had to do that and you're starting to realize how much work it is to have all of those manuals in in place because you do need them. More with that is having your own practice is expensive. There is expenses you do not just buy everything once spend let's say $30,000 if you are mobile like me I had to buy the compressor the patient chair you know all of that. I took out about $30,000. Yes. Um, but there's more expenses you will have to buy toothbrushes, you will have to buy instruments, you will have to buy cassettes, you will have to buy pouches for sterilizing you will have to buy indicators. Masks you will have to buy gloves you will have to buy saliva ejectors you get the idea. Things are expensive and you get very sad throwing things away you know that type of thing right. With the new infection control policies yes they're amazing but there's so much waste. I just kind of feel like oh there's money going down the drain right here but it is what it is right so those are some pros and cons for you there are a ton more but I'm starting to lose my boys I can't actually hear very well my ears are now plugged. So thank you guys so much for listening please I apologize again for the poor quality, but I hope this helped pros and cons for having your own dental hygiene practice let me know if you have any questions and thank you guys for listening. I will talk to you guys very very soon.