Accountability for Every Dollar: Smarter Systems for Dental Practice Revenue

You and your team work hard for every dollar your dental practice brings in.
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Yet, at the end of each month, you might be left asking the question:
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Where is the money?
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We can’t tell you where your money is. But we have a good idea. Here’s what usually happens:

Your employees who could have been scheduling appointments, educating patients, or managing the practice are burned out from insurance-related tasks.

Then, when claims are finally submitted, many get denied or delayed due to small errors, such as a missing attachment or an incorrect code. Claims pile up, cash flow stalls, and the money you've earned sits out of reach.
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This cycle isn’t sustainable, but it’s the reality for many dental practices. You’re able to get by fine, but you're not laying a foundation for scaling your practice. If you want your practice to generate seven figures consistently, then you need to invest in better systems. In this article, we will discuss where your money is and how to get it.
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Your money is hiding in collections

A large portion of revenue sits in collections. If your collection rate is below 98%, money is being left on the table. When your practice grows, whether by adding new patients or new locations, it becomes nearly impossible to keep up with insurance claims, verifications, and payments internally. You're caught in a constant battle to stay ahead of these tasks.

Jenny Fetty, Vice President of Dental Sales at Medusind, a national leader in dental billing & RCM solutions, sees this every day: "The biggest pain point we see is practices trying to grow without the infrastructure to support their revenue cycle. Their staff ends up overwhelmed, and collections inevitably suffer."
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Your employees likely aren’t revenue-cycle experts, and hiring specialized staff to handle billing internally can become too expensive depending on the size of your practice. This inefficiency shows up clearly in industry benchmarks:

• Average net collection rates hover around 91%. Which is well below the 98% achievable with proper systems.
• Nearly 30% of insurance claims sit unpaid for over 90 days, significantly impacting your cash flow.

You’ve worked hard for your money. It’s important to have a system in place to collect as much of it as possible.
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A smarter system to maximize collections and increase cash on hand

Revenue cycle management (RCM) is crucial for dental practices aiming to maintain steady cash flow, minimize denials, and increase overall profitability. Effective RCM involves several best practices:

• Proactive insurance verification: Performing insurance eligibility checks prior to patient appointments helps identify coverage limitations, pre-authorization requirements, and other potential billing obstacles in advance. This practice significantly reduces claim denials, enhances patient transparency regarding their financial responsibilities, and ultimately improves patient satisfaction and trust.
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• Automated claims scrubbing: Automated claims scrubbing tools systematically identify common errors such as missing patient information, incorrect procedure codes, or outdated insurance data before claims are submitted. This proactive error detection helps practices avoid costly resubmissions, minimizes claim rejections, and speeds up reimbursements.
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• Timely follow ups: Implementing a structured, timely follow-up process for unpaid or delayed claims is critical for maintaining cash flow. Regular monitoring allows practices to quickly address denials, resolve discrepancies, and expedite delayed payments. Prompt follow-ups significantly reduce outstanding receivables, ensuring more consistent revenue.

Instituting these practices helps dental offices significantly boost their net collection rates, typically reaching upwards of 98%, and creates a predictable, reliable cash flow. This improves the dental practice evaluation.

As Jenny from Medusind notes:

"When practices partner with us, their staff can refocus on patient care. We handle the complexities of the insurance cycle, freeing your team from hours on the phone each day."

Medusind supports dental practices by providing specialized teams dedicated to managing complex insurance tasks, including eligibility verification, claim submissions, payment posting, denial management, credentialing, and diligent follow-ups. Leveraging dedicated experts ensures that these RCM best practices become seamlessly integrated into daily operations, achieving measurable financial improvement without burdening your internal staff.

This is one of a few places your money is hiding. But it’s not the only place. One of the other areas your money hides is in your dental supplies. You may be paying too much for them over time, and by doing that, your net earnings decrease. Not good.

You want every dollar to be accounted for. You also want to maximize the EBITDA your dental practice achieves.

Smarter systems, bigger profits

By centralizing and simplifying revenue management processes, your practice stops leaking cash. A portion of your collected dollars can now be reinvested into patient care, advanced equipment, marketing, staff training, or expanding locations.

At the end of the day, your practice valuation is up to you and how you manage your funds. You can create processes that help you manage your funds so that every dollar billed is collected and managed. With the right systems in place, your team can focus on what matters most: delivering exceptional care and growing a practice built to last.

To see if you can increase cash collected, reach out to our partners at Medusind. They can help with Revenue Cycle Management and get you more cash in your dental practice's pockets. The more money you collect, and as your costs decrease, your EBITDA increases and so too does your practice's value.

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