It is interesting listening to dentists discuss various patients.
Often we hear something like this,
"I tried to explain how important it was to keep the tooth, but after telling and telling them, they still wanted it out."
Don't beg!
It's not only humiliating to beg your patient's to go ahead with treatment, but it's counter-productive. If they don't want to save a tooth, that's their business.
It's not your tooth or mouth. You don't have to live with it.
When you beg a patient desperately, it does two things:
1. It turns the patient off. No one wants to buy from a desperate person.
2. If you seem desperate, the patient assumes you are wanting them to do it because you need the money. It just doesn't make sense to a patient that you want them to do it because you are emotionally invested in other people's teeth.
So the more you beg them to get a root canal, the more likely they are to get it extracted.
It's also not productive to fight with your patients
If your patient doesn't want to get X-rays, pushing them hard to get them will not help. Telling them they are wrong to not want them just make them dig in more.
Try to discuss things from their point of view, not yours.
"I don't want xrays".
Oh, what is your concern?
"I'm worried about the cost".
Now at this point, you can go into all sorts of logical explanations about why you need to get the X-rays to prevent caries and perio.
Or you can just say:
"I understand and if you don't want to spend the money, that's your business. Some of our patients have avoided xrays not realising you can't feel a cavity until your tooth is cactus. Once they had a toothache, it cost $3000 to fix instead of $300, and we had to take four xrays all at once! Hopefully you don't end up in such a state".
Then say no more. If the patient still doesn't want to engage after an educational statement like that, then you may as well not talk about it any further anyway. You'll just be fighting with the patient and rarely can you fight someone into wanting to buy from you.
Now, what if you really need the X-rays for some kind of treatment? Then just say you respect them and then politely point out that you cannot treat them until they get the necessary records.
You aren't desperate.
So remember, don't beg, don't fight.
