“NO-SHOW” shall mean any patient who fails to arrive for a scheduled appointment.
“Same Day Cancellation” shall mean any patient who cancels an appointment less than 24 hours before their scheduled appointment.
“LATE ARRIVAL” shall mean any patient who arrives 15 minutes late for any appointment one hour or less and 20 minutes late for any appointment more than 1 hour after the expected arrival time for the scheduled appointment.
“POLICY” – It is the policy and practice to monitor and manage appointment no-shows and late cancellations.
Our goal is to provide excellent dental care to each patient in a timely manner. If it is necessary to cancel an
appointment, patients are required to call or leave a message at least 24 hours before their appointment time. Notification helps the dental facility efficiently use appointments for other patients needing care.
Procedure
A patient is notified of this policy at the time of scheduling. This policy will be presented to patients requiring their signature stating that they understand the policy.
Patients:
- Appointments must be cancelled at least 24 hours prior to the scheduled appointment time.
- In the event the patient arrives late as defined by “late arrival” to their appointment and cannot be seen by the provider they will be rescheduled for a future appointment.
- A written warning will be provided to the patient after one no-show/same day cancellation.
- In the event a patient has incurred two no-shows and/or same day cancellations within a 12-month period they will not be able to receive an appointment for up to three months from the date of their last no-show/same day cancellation.
- In the event the patient has incurred three no-shows in a 6-month period the patient will be suspended from the dental facility for one year from the date of their last no-show/same day cancellation.
We have patients, due to the nature of the procedures required due to their oral health, which are given multiple appointments or extended appointments therefore the no/show policy should be modified for these patients.
- In the event a patient has multiple appointments and they no show/cancel the same day they will lose the remaining appointments and will revert to one appointment at a time.
If a patient has longer appointments and cancels or does not show on the same day, they will no longer be eligible for extended length appointments.
If a dentist needs to bypass this policy for a patient’s dental health reasons, approval from the clinical manager is required.