Understanding your Dental Insurance

Over the years, I have heard it all when it comes to insurance. From “my insurance pays 100%”, to “I’m not sure what my insurance is.” The thing that I have learned is that many of these plans are not properly explained, if at all, to the employee and/or subscriber at the time they are purchased. Not only does this leave patients with questions, it also creates extra work for our office to provide the patients with the most current and up to date coverage under their plan. For a long time, dental insurance was nothing more than an add on to the medical coverage. Unfortunately, even though this is not the case any more, the coverage for most of these plans has remained unchanged in the last 40 years. The best time to find out all you can about your insurance is either during the open enrollment period with your employer, or if you are self-insured, while the representative is there to sell the plan, ask as many questions as you can. Ultimately, your insurance is a contract between you, your employer, and the insurance company. We are not a party to that contract.

As a courtesy to our patients, our office does contact the dental insurance carrier. We receive a summary of benefits, but only the information the insurance is willing to reveal. With this information, we are able to give our patients a close approximation of what they can expect to pay out of pocket. This does not let the patient off the hook though. Patients need to be well versed and pay attention to the explanation of benefits that the insurance company provides. Some situations require documentation from the patient and a claim can be held up if the patient is unaware of it, such as primary and secondary information, divorce decrees, and student status.

During the beginning of each year employers search for new, less expensive plans and therefore may change plans. Patients need to be aware of any changes in their plan and be prepared to provide this to our office. I don’t know how many January’s I’ve spent sorting through plans because the patients didn’t know their employer changed plans, or were given very little information about the new plan including a new dental card. This will unnecessarily delay a claim. If we cannot receive payment from the insurance company, the balance of all work that was completed then becomes the responsibility of the patient.

Being an active participant in your plan not only benefits you, but it also helps our office do what we do best and that is to give our patients the best dental care around!

-Lisa Karau

the Levine Dental Team

Would you pay for email?

I read a blog today from Jerry Jones (http://www.dentalmarketingtips.com/blog/wordpress). I was a bit disturbed. It appears that a story/rumor has leaked about AOL and Yahoo charging a fee for each email sent via their servers/services.

Jerry's blog says charges would be minimal per message ($.01). How much email do you use regularly? I know I'm always in constant inbox patrol mode and when something comes in, a message usually goes out in response. I probably send more then 50 emails in the morning alone on any given day.

Does this hurt the bottom line? Not for AOL or Yahoo? What is Google doing differently that they aren't planning to charge for email services? Will this catch on with local ISP's? Will we all be paying per email no matter where we go or what services we use?

Cellular phone technology has caught up to the internet, and most providers offer a data plan. Most providers will also offer an unlimited texting option as well as unlimited phone minutes.

Does this disturb you?

Would you find another outlet of communication to use if you were to be charged a fee per email sent? Are social media networks to blame? Are they stealing the ad traffic that Yahoo and AOL depend on in their email messages?

What do you think?

Giving Back

Those of us at Levine Dental Associates have always strived to give back to our community. We try to do this on a continual basis throughout the year. Our larger annual events are our holiday food and gift drive starting in November and our Halloween Candy Buy-Back.

The Halloween Candy Buy-Back program is a wonderful and easy way to help support our troops. The time is upon us for our third annual Levine Dental Halloween Candy Buy-Back. During the month of October you will see our office transformed for Halloween. On Monday, November 2, 2009 between 8am and 5:30pm we will buy back all of your extra Halloween candy for $2.00 per pound (up to a 100 lb max unless special arrangements are made in advance). This candy will then be shipped to Operation Gratitude for disbursement to our troops all across the globe.

Operation Gratitude seeks to lift morale and put smiles on faces by sending care packages addressed to individual soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines deployed overseas. Operation Gratitude care packages contain food, hygiene products, entertainment items and personal letters of appreciation, all wrapped with good wishes of love and support. They need everyone’s help and we can all do our part through our Candy Buy-Back here in Milwaukee.

As in the past, we will be happy to accept other donations for that will help benefit the troops. Those items include: new or gently used DVD’s, CD’s, new batteries, knit or crocheted scarves, microwave popcorn, and new or gently used books.

These items can be brought to our office at anytime through November 6, 2009. Candy can also be brought in early. Please help us top the 1000 pounds we collected last year. More importantly help us support those that are making our country safe and free. Call the office today for more information.