How to Increase Case Acceptance Without Feeling Salesy: The 4-Level Patient Communication Framework
Key Takeaways:
How to Calculate Case Acceptance: Learn the simple formula to measure your case acceptance rate and why it matters.
Why Your Case Acceptance Might Be Low: Presenting high-cost treatment plans to patients who aren’t ready can hurt your acceptance rate.
Patient Segmentation: Tailor treatment recommendations based on a patient’s financial and behavioral readiness to boost acceptance.
Efficient Treatment Planning: Stop wasting time on unlikely-to-accept patients and focus on realistic, achievable plans.
Build Trust: Align your treatment plans with what your patients are ready for, building long-term relationships and retention.
Increase Profitability: Streamlined case acceptance leads to higher revenue, increased patient lifetime value, and more efficient practice management.
TABLE INCLUDED: Click Here for a detailed table of the 4 levels of Patient Commitment
Are You Struggling with Low Case Acceptance? You’re Not Alone.
Are you finding it difficult to get patients to accept treatments like night guards, clear aligners, or even basic preventive care? Does it feel like no matter how much time you spend explaining the benefits, patients just don’t commit to moving forward? If you’ve been in practice for a while, this struggle might sound familiar.
One critical metric that often gets overlooked when discussing treatment planning is your case acceptance rate. If you’re not tracking it, you’re missing a key insight into how your recommendations are being received by patients—and where you can make improvements.
How to Calculate Case Acceptance
Calculating your case acceptance is simple and provides a clear picture of how well you’re converting treatment plans into accepted cases. The formula is:
Case Acceptance Rate = (Number of Accepted Treatment Plans ÷ Number of Presented Treatment Plans) × 100
For example, if you present 20 treatment plans in a week and 12 of them are accepted, your case acceptance rate is:
(12 ÷ 20) × 100 = 60%
A higher case acceptance rate indicates that more patients are saying "yes" to the treatments you're recommending, which directly impacts your revenue, practice efficiency, and patient retention. Many successful practices aim for a case acceptance rate of 70-90%, but for newer dentists, the rate might be significantly lower—especially if treatment plans don’t align with patient readiness.
Why Is Your Case Acceptance Rate Low?
One reason case acceptance might be low is that you’re presenting treatment plans that don’t match where the patient is at financially or behaviorally. Sure, you're recommending the best course of action, but that might involve $5,000-$10,000 treatment plans for patients who have only ever opted for the basics covered by their insurance.
By planning for the ideal scenario for every patient—no matter their financial circumstances or engagement level—you might actually be hurting your case acceptance percentage. When you spend time creating complex, high-cost plans for patients who aren’t ready to commit, you increase the number of presented treatment plans without increasing the number of accepted plans. This skews your acceptance percentage downward, which directly impacts the overall productivity and profitability of your practice.
Streamlining Case Acceptance: The Solution
Improving your case acceptance isn't just about delivering high-quality care; it's about ensuring your treatment recommendations are realistic and achievable for your patients. Streamlining your case acceptance process involves making sure that the plans you present are tailored to the patient's level of commitment, financial situation, and overall readiness for treatment.
1. Maximizing Efficiency Through Patient Segmentation
By categorizing patients based on their level of commitment, you can tailor treatment options to their readiness and financial situation. This segmentation approach improves operational efficiency, reducing time wasted on patients who are less likely to accept comprehensive, high-cost plans. Instead, it ensures that you're presenting treatment options they’re more likely to accept, which in turn increases your case acceptance rate.
For example, if a patient has historically only accepted insurance-covered treatments, it may not make sense to present an extensive treatment plan that includes expensive elective procedures. Instead, focus on necessary treatments covered by insurance, with optional upgrades. This approach avoids overwhelming the patient while still offering opportunities for higher-value care as their trust and commitment grow.
2. Customized Treatment Recommendations for Higher Acceptance
When you streamline case acceptance, you’re focusing on presenting realistic, achievable solutions that match the patient’s willingness and ability to commit to care. By targeting treatment plans based on where the patient is now, rather than where you want them to be, you reduce inefficiencies in case presentation. This not only saves time and resources but also results in higher acceptance rates, ultimately boosting your practice’s revenue and productivity.
3. Building Trust and Long-Term Retention
When patients feel that your recommendations are aligned with their current situation, they’re more likely to trust you. Over time, as their comfort and trust grow, you can gradually introduce more preventive or elective treatments, moving them toward proactive care. This approach builds long-term patient retention and increases the overall lifetime value of each patient, which has a substantial impact on your practice’s profitability.
4. Ethical and Equal Patient Treatment
It’s essential to ensure that all patients are treated equally and ethically, regardless of their financial capacity. The goal of streamlining your case acceptance isn’t to reduce the quality of care—it’s to ensure that your recommendations are realistic and achievable, maximizing both patient satisfaction and practice profitability. By making sure that every treatment plan is appropriate to the patient’s commitment level, you’re helping patients make decisions that benefit their health while also improving your bottom line.
The Bottom Line
Improving your case acceptance rate is not just about presenting the "best" treatment—it’s about understanding your patients and tailoring your recommendations to what they’re realistically ready for. By optimizing your treatment planning process and segmenting your patients based on their commitment level, you can improve your case acceptance percentage, increase practice efficiency, and boost revenue. In the long run, this strategy will help you provide better care while building long-term, trusting relationships with your patients.
Disclaimer: This document and the associated patient commitment framework are intended for internal educational purposes within dental practices only. It is not intended to serve as legal, medical, or clinical advice. While this framework offers strategic guidance on patient communication and case acceptance, all treatment decisions must be made based on a dentist's professional judgment, in compliance with the established standard of care within the dental profession. All patients, regardless of their financial situation or level of engagement, must receive care that meets or exceeds the standard of care required by law. The information provided in this document should not be interpreted as advocating for unequal treatment of patients or for adjusting clinical decisions based on financial considerations alone. This tool is to be used to supplement—not replace—the professional discretion of the dentist, and all recommendations must align with ethical guidelines and applicable regulations. The use of this framework is at the discretion of the dental professional, and it is the responsibility of the dentist to ensure that all patient communications and treatment decisions adhere to legal and ethical standards.