When presenting a treatment plan to a patient and budget is a barrier, going into the room you should always be prepared to talk to the patient about care credit. Care credit can be described as a health care credit card patients are able to use to pay for dental treatment at our office. Our office has a contract with care credit that allows us to sign patients up for care credit and patients are able to spend (up to the cards max), and patients are then able to pay back Care Credit with no interest if the full amount charged is paid back within six months. If the full amount is not paid back, care credit will charge interest at a rather high rate.
In order to sign a patient up for care credit, you will first need to ask the patient if they have ever heard of care credit, some have and already have a card, others will not know what it is. If the patient does not know what care credit is and is interested in learning more you can present them with one of the brochures we keep in the front office (middle cabinet, bottom shelf, on the left side).
You need to explain to the patient that if they are interested in moving forward with the application process, it could reflect as an inquiry on their credit report. Sometimes when patients learn this, because of factors going on in their life; such as buying a home or car, they decide at that point they do not want to move forward with the application.
Sometimes after learning about care credit, patients will take the information you gave them home to think about. Let the patient know they are able to fill out an application themselves at home or they can call to schedule a time to come in so we can assist them with the application should they choose to move forward.
