As a dentist I understand you have flexibility over when you work assuming you own your own practice. Has anyone tried having their office open 12 hours a day for 3-4 days a week? What are the pros and cons of doing this. Is it hard to find people willing to work these hours? How exhausting is a 12 hour working day? Is it hard to fill these days? Do people not want to go in at 7:00 PM for a cleaning on a weekday?
12 Hour Working Days?
- Thread starter monkeykey
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For the bulk of my private practice days ... I worked M-thurs with staggered hours. Two days: 7-4pm. The other two days: 9-6pm. I had it good. Nowadays .... I guess we all need to be more available to the patients for economic reasons. I can tell you that during my typical work days .... I absolutely CHERISHED my 1 hour lunch break to GET AWAY FROM THE OFFICE. I needed that break. I physically left the office to go somewhere. Quick lunch. Go to the PGA superstore, etc. etc.
You've got to pace yourself for a long career.
As for staff. Cannot imagine most staff would like that 3-4 day work week 12 hour days. I mean those 12 hour days are essentially spent for work and nothing else. I'll pass.
You've got to pace yourself for a long career.
As for staff. Cannot imagine most staff would like that 3-4 day work week 12 hour days. I mean those 12 hour days are essentially spent for work and nothing else. I'll pass.
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12 hours of clinical dentistry? No thanks. Brutal on the body and not sustainable long term in my opinion. Wealth building wise - better to practice 6-8 hours a day and spend another 6-8 hours building something else that makes money while you sleep, better still is something that is sustainable into retirement to supplement your retirement income.
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When I started my first office, I worked 12+ hours a day. I worked 9-6 at the corp office and then I drove straight to my own office to treat patients from 6:30pm-9:00pm. My wife came to help work in both front and back. She collected the payments, sat the patients and removed the color alastics for me before I arrive. We had worked like this for about 2 years.
Pros:
- I didn’t have to quit my day time associate job at the corp and continued to earn a nice income and had comfortable lifestyle…nice cars, nice house, good food etc even when my newly built office was losing money.
- Some patients and parents’ patients love the late night hours because they have to work during the day.
- I felt very happy that my new office had patients for me to treat. Since my office was brand new, I didn’t care about my time and I just wanted to attract as many new patients as possible. It’s actually more depressing when the appt book is empty. I’d rather work and make money to pay for the fixed expense than facing the stress of having no new patients and still have to pay for the fixed expenses.
- I’ve never felt tired when I work for myself. It's actually the opposite....the more patients I have the happier I feel. But when I work for the corp, I always want to come home ASAP.
- Easy money. I saw about 6-10 patients during this 6:30p-9:00 pm time frame. I did all the wire changes myself. Each patient paid me $100-150 per office visit.
Cons:
- Couldn’t see my kids. We had a live-in nanny. My kids were only 1-2 yo at that time so they didn’t care if my wife and I were there or not. By the time my older kid started school (kindergarten), my office became more established and I no longer needed to work long hours.
- Couldn’t find employee, who was willing to work that late. So my wife had to come help. Later on, I was able to get one of the RDAs at the corp to come to work with me after we finish work at the corp.
- Some patients were spoiled with the late hours….it took me a while to completely eliminate the late office hours.
Pros:
- I didn’t have to quit my day time associate job at the corp and continued to earn a nice income and had comfortable lifestyle…nice cars, nice house, good food etc even when my newly built office was losing money.
- Some patients and parents’ patients love the late night hours because they have to work during the day.
- I felt very happy that my new office had patients for me to treat. Since my office was brand new, I didn’t care about my time and I just wanted to attract as many new patients as possible. It’s actually more depressing when the appt book is empty. I’d rather work and make money to pay for the fixed expense than facing the stress of having no new patients and still have to pay for the fixed expenses.
- I’ve never felt tired when I work for myself. It's actually the opposite....the more patients I have the happier I feel. But when I work for the corp, I always want to come home ASAP.
- Easy money. I saw about 6-10 patients during this 6:30p-9:00 pm time frame. I did all the wire changes myself. Each patient paid me $100-150 per office visit.
Cons:
- Couldn’t see my kids. We had a live-in nanny. My kids were only 1-2 yo at that time so they didn’t care if my wife and I were there or not. By the time my older kid started school (kindergarten), my office became more established and I no longer needed to work long hours.
- Couldn’t find employee, who was willing to work that late. So my wife had to come help. Later on, I was able to get one of the RDAs at the corp to come to work with me after we finish work at the corp.
- Some patients were spoiled with the late hours….it took me a while to completely eliminate the late office hours.
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I am glad I did what I did 12-13 years ago. Now at 48, I no longer have to worry about losing my associate jobs, about losing the referrals from general dentists, losing patients to a nearby competitor, about the recessions….and the recession that we are facing right now. I already paid off all the loans for my rental properties. If I was ok with living in a small house, driving the same cheap Japanese car for the next 10 years, and giving up the lifestyle I currently enjoy, I could retire now.
I’ve always encouraged young kids (including my own kids) not to waste too much time in college (skip a year if they can) and try to earn a professional degree as early as possible. The sooner you start making money, the sooner you will become financially independent. Being a young rich person also helps a lot…prestige, respect, lifestyle, meeting a person whom you want to marry......nobody wants to marry a loser.
Even with working 12 hours a day during those 2 years, I still managed to have 1-week long vacation + several 3-4 day mini-vacations (President’s Day, Memorial Day, Independent Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, Xmas etc) every year. Since nobody wanted to be in pain (ie getting their braces tightened) before the long weekend getaways, so I had to close my offices and took vacations on those days.
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Maybe its just me, but I currently work 10 hours a day at a non dental related office then had a commute of an hour each way before corona. I think I'd prefer to work more hours and less days. Say 3 12 hour days a week. Would most dentists say their productivity goes down at the end of the day? If it takes me 3 hours to do at the end of the day what it would take me to do in 1 hour at the begging of the day then it might not be worth it. @TanMan What are your thoughts on end of day productivity as a dentist?
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I tend to be more productive near the end because I want to finish faster. I will process more patients at the end of the day, v. the beginning of the day. I'd do 12 hours a day IF I can have all 13 columns full the whole time. Otherwise, it's just a waste of time and resources.
Right now, hygiene is zero'd out due to governor mandate 🙄, elective procedures are out, but thankfully we're still able to pack 4-6 columns of emergencies during this hard time. I think this will hurt my competitors more than it hurts me. We even had to buy another cerec from a failing office to meet emergency demands.
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good luck trying to hire staff to work those crappy hours
I don't think it would be that bad. Work 3 days a week and then have a 4 day weekend every week.
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You probably need 2 different shifts of staff to avoid overtime on those workers.
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If you don't mind paying extra (ie 1.5 times more), you should have zero problem finding the assistants. It's still better than working at the fast food restaurants, where you'll have to work until mid-night or later. Here in CA, we have a surplus of dental assistants.
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The problem with opening only 3 days/week as a general dentist is you will miss a lot of walk-in patients. If the patients come to your office and see a CLOSED sign, they will walk to another dental office down the street to get the treatment there. Doctor's availalibity is very important in attracting new patients. A lot of patients prefer to see dentists that have weekend hours.
Specialists like OS, perio, ortho have more freedom to book their patients because they don't have emergency walkin patients like general dentists. Patients usually see the specialists by appointments only. That's why I can book all 350 of my active patients in 4 work days in a month at one of my offices. And my offices don't have to be located in highly visible areas (ie a busy shopping center).
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How common are walk in patients? I was under the impression that besides emergencies most offices are almost fully scheduled for at least a week out?
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Very common. I remember when I worked as a GPR resident, I got called in very often to take care of dental emergencies such as dental advulsion, periconitis, dental abscesses, endo related pain, loose/broken anterior bridges etc…especially on the weekends when most of the dental offices were closed. I guess if you practice in an area where you have unlimited supply of patients and there is no nearby competing office, you should be fine with 3 opening days a week. With the openings of new dental schools that pump out more new grads every year, I am afraid it’s impossible to find such place to set up your practice. Big dental corps and some dentists (ColdFront is one of these dentists) pay a lot of money to rent office spaces that are located in busy shopping centers and put up big signs to attract more patients. The reason private offices have lost a lot of patients to corp offices is corp have convenient office hours (late and weekend hours) and affordable fees (PPO, HMO, medicaid are accepted).
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A data point of anecdotal evidence... due to the regulations of my state, we are emergency only until April 22nd. So... I'm stuck doing emergencies only and as an emergency dentist, we're getting a lot of walkins everyday. At least 5-10 per day of walkins besides the scheduled emergency visit.
I can't wait till April 22nd. We will have the floodgates open and ready for business on that date. That is, unless the government decides to extend their mandates. We already have a campaign ready for launch a week before that tentative date. This is driving me nuts. I wish I had more rooms to accommodate the massive surge in demand on the 22nd onwards.
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N95 w/ level 3 in front, faceshield, loupesm bouffant, gown, medical grade hepa filter in every room now, changed the hvac air filters to merv 14 air filters, I have one room as a negative pressure room (trying to convert all to negative pressure) and currently converting all rooms to negative pressure rooms.
Edit: I don't use shoe covers. I hate them.
Edit: I don't use shoe covers. I hate them.
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12 hours of straight dentistry is brutal on the body and the mind. You have to constantly be "on" with patients. Make them comfortable, make them laugh, make them connect with you, make them understand treatment and want to come back to get it done. It's brutal. I'm more productive on a shorter day (6 hours) vs. a longer day (10+). I build a good schedule, tend to treatment plan better because I'm not tired. My shorter days are as productive as the longer ones. I work some evenings and the night appointments are booked first and patients very rare cancel. It's a prime time appointment.
If you own an office and want to run 12 straight hours, you'll need to split staff. Very, very hard to find someone who will work that schedule for a long time and you'll probably pay overtime too.
The office I associate at is in the same place for many, many years in a residential area of a medium-sized city. We get walk-ins ALL THE TIME. We also try to see emergency patients same day if we can.
If you own an office and want to run 12 straight hours, you'll need to split staff. Very, very hard to find someone who will work that schedule for a long time and you'll probably pay overtime too.
The office I associate at is in the same place for many, many years in a residential area of a medium-sized city. We get walk-ins ALL THE TIME. We also try to see emergency patients same day if we can.
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Maybe add diluted peroxide rinse and take temps of pts.
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Already done. Along with COVID19 screening form. First, we greet, take temp (Edit: Fill out screening form in front - few check boxes, any YES, go to your doctor), have them fill out health history form in isolated room, take care of all paperwork and billing in that isolated room. No more than one patient in any hallway at any time. No stragglers/guests allowed in the room unless they are mentally incapable of making a decision or a minor. We're still in the process of installing UV sterilization in every room, but I think we have reasonable infection control protocol. Good thing I have a good stock of Cavi1. Patients are willing to pay extra for these precautions. These N95 masks cost 10-15 dollars each on the secondary markets.
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I'll let you know at the end of the month regarding 12 hour working days and pros/cons. We're seeing a very strong demand on the return of hygiene/elective dental care as soon as this mandate is lifted. We're contemplating opening 12-16 hours/day, 4-5 hygienists on the first few days immediately after this mandate to make sure we can accomodate everyone, just in case our governor decides to change his mind. I will most likely be paying OT and unfortunately, I don't think I have enough time to expand on the new side (nor could it be financially worth it at this time for this temporary surge) - this is one of those days where I wish my office was bigger. The bigger challenge will be instituing these new IC protocols with a large volume of patients.
