Your super-efficiency and hard work as a dental practitioner and office manager have helped you scale your practice. You are opening up your practice at a second location (or multiple locations). Congratulations! With the new location, don’t think your work will get easier. In fact, your work has 
become even harder.
Expanding to new locations comes with its own set of challenges such as scattering of data at multiple locations, risk of unsatisfactory patient experience, difficulty in staff management and data analysis, setting up protocols and systems, security issues, etc. To solve this myriad of challenges, you should move your practice to a cloud-based practice management solution—in case you haven’t done so.
When you do decide to migrate to cloud-based technology, make sure you choose a single-database system rather than a multiple-database system. There are many advantages to using a single-database system and the most important ones are discussed below.
Cloud dental software provides you with real-time data and works on the “concept of one”. It is feasible to access patient records, schedules, supplies, billing, and other information from any location at any time. Efficient updates of the patient’s health record and the appointment schedules happen and these changes are visible instantaneously across all your locations.
What does this mean to you? With just your login details, a web browser, and an Internet connection, you will be able to achieve the following:
And much more.
With every location that you open, you have to individually set the protocols for fee schedules, insurance billing, staff management, and other important information. All of these tasks are time-consuming. Also, it is difficult to control the access your staff has over all the practice details. Even if you are using a cloud-based PMS with multiple-database, you would have to go through this pain-taking task for every new location.
Compare this with a single-database dental practice management software, where you can share fee schedules, insurance plans, and other important information seamlessly within multiple locations. This allows powerful, time-saving standardization across all the locations. Also, these cloud-based dental management software gives you the power to control access of different user profiles based on their jobs at your practice locations, with a full audit trail.
Old school practice management software required the setting up of dedicated hardware— servers, client machines, storage, etc. To set-up and maintain these systems you needed dedicated staff—an IT personnel, software vendors, and training staff, to name a few. You would have to deal with staff training, worn-out hardware, software updates, and more. With each change, you would need people to manage systems and re-train your staff, which cost time and money.
On the other hand, a cloud-based PMS is hardware-independent and compatible with all platforms, which makes it easier for you and your team to access any data from any device you are comfortable with. Your dental management software is always updated and maintained by an off-site IT team, your data is always backed-up securely, support is just a phone call away.
With all its benefits, you may think that a cloud-based PMS is expensive when compared to a traditional dental practice management software. But, cloud-based PMSs are actually cheaper.
With old dental management software, you did not just pay your vendor only for software, you also had to pay for specialized hardware, servers, training staff, and support staff. Due to the distributed nature of support, the software vendor needed to employ a large number of support-staff—which ultimately increased the cost of ownership.
Cloud software, on the other hand, do not need special hardware or can only be supported at one location. The users simply use the Internet to access the software from anywhere in the world. It is similar to making any online purchase—it is secure, and available anywhere.
Combine these with economies of scale, and you can see why a cloud-based dental software costs significantly less than a traditional PMS.
Most data breaches, which include HIPAA violations, happen due to loss of a physical storage media. A missing flash drive, a stolen laptop, or a burglary at your practice can cause loss of precious data and put you out of compliance. The result—fines worth thousands, a difficult conversation with your patients, and loss of confidence.
A centralized cloud-based PMS saves you from all these risks by storing all your data in on their servers behind secure firewalls. Not only is the data stored securely, but there are multiple redundant backups to ensure that your data is always safe. The only things you need to keep safe are your credentials.
If you’re on the edge about moving to the cloud, now is the time to do so. Not only are cloud-based PMS safer, but they are also reliable, flexible and cost effective.
Tab32 is one such comprehensive cloud-based PMS that is packed with features allowing you to efficiently and seamlessly manage the front and back office of your multi-location practice. It is a single-database multi-location PMS and has all the advantages that we have discussed in the article. It also complies with the HIPAA regulations, thereby storing your multi-location practices’ data securely. Sign-up today for free one-on-one demo of all its wonderful features.
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