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The day-to-day running of a practice can be hectic at times, so many dental professionals use set systems and procedures to streamline their work. After all, less time on the backend means more time on patient care. But occasionally, cutting corners can lead to unwanted risk. This is especially true when it comes to patient records. Taking shortcuts on charting, such as using preestablished templates, can cause more headaches down the road.
When working with dental patients, clinical notes are crucial, and using a clinical notes template helps alleviate the pressure to write everything down. It seems like a no-brainer to use a clinical notes template. It sounds efficient and helpful – but doing so may lead to a few problems if they are not set up properly in your software.
Missing information from clinical notes that you attach to your dental insurance claims can lead to denials. Insurance claim denials then lead to extra claims work for your team and delays in payment from insurance. This is valuable income that you deserve to be collecting.
One Dental Billing has been working with dental teams for over 10 years to submit clean, accurate insurance claims. Through this work, we have seen how dental clinical notes templates can help, but also hinder teams from getting proper reimbursement. Sounds contradictory, right?
Pro’s
Con’s
Lastly, it is my experience that documenting non-clinical information, while not clinically relevant, adds believability, a greater sense of reliability, and helps tell the story of what happened. Most patients who file complaints against their dentist never voice their concern to the dentist, so documenting patient behavior, compliance with treatment (or the lack thereof), missed/ late appointments, and et cetera can paint (in advance of a complaint) quite a picture in your favor.
In closing – remember four things:
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