How do you get new patients?

New patients come to our office from a variety of sources. Some are referred by our patients. This is a time honored way for a dentist to attract new patients. Existing patients refer us their friends and colleagues. This is a good way to find a dentist, since often the person referring the patient has been a patient in our dental practice for a number of years. Referrals from my family and good friends tend to fall into this category since many of whom are also my  patients. These people tend to know me very well and thankfully most trust me with their friend's dental care.

Another source of patients is a referral from another doctor. Often the doctor is also a patient, so they have first hand experience with our practice as well. This is  a great way to find a dentist, and this is my favorite way of choosing my doctors- I ask my doctor to refer me to another type of specialist. I believe that in medicine and in dentistry, "birds of a feather tend to flock together" and if one doctor I like refers me to another, there's a decent chance I will be satisfied with this referral.

Increasingly a number of my patients are self referred from the internet. These patients have either read my online reviews,  looked at my blog or website (or all of the above). These patients are welcome as new patients  as long as they understand that we are primarily a fee for service dental practice and for the most part do not participate in dental insurance plans. We help process dental insurance claims and usually accept assignment of benefits, but patients are responsible for paying any portion of our fee not covered by their dental insurance.

About the author: Lawrence Spindel DDS is a dentist who has maintained  a general and cosmetic dental practice in New York City, for over thirty years .