Curated Content For Busy Dental Professionals

Calculate Your Expected PPE Costs

As dental practices plan for a return, many are worried about the increased cost of PPE. Don't panice. Use this tool to calculate your PPE.

04/28/2020

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Many dentists are concerned about the cost of PPE and the impact on profitability.  Thus, the question, what are insurance companies going to do to help share the cost.

Delta Dental of CT/NJ has offered temporary assistance as follows.  We’ll continue to keep you posted as we hear more.

However, before we go looking for relief, let’s answer four basic questions.

PPE Calculator TemplateDownload

Who’s going to be your Infection Control captain?

• Pay this person a per hour premium for managing this important responsibility.
• Give them clear responsibilities, a job description and budget.

What PPE will provide appropriate risk mitigation?

• N95 Mask with face shield?
• Shoe coverings?
• Goggles?
• Hair caps?
• Disposable gowns?

Material Cost

• Put someone on your team in charge of sourcing masks, gloves, gowns.
• Inquire about purchasing versus laundering gowns.  For example, Cintas’ scrub rental service
• Cleaning supplies to wipe down surfaces, chairs, etc.
• Non-contact thermometer for patient evaluation.

Time Cost

• How much longer will it take to clean and prep operatories?
• What changes will we need to make to the setup/layout of our operatories to mitigate risk (i.e., removing sonicare displays and other marketing/advertising from countertops and posted to cabinetry)?

The Math

Once you have calculated those costs, understand these as a percentage of daily collections.  Here is an example:

My back of the napkin math turns out to be about 4% of daily production for an assistant.  Start with this template (under the picture above) to add additional costs and staffing for your practice. Most examples I tinkered with will increase costs 6-10%.

Next Steps

Knowing this, we can begin to think about how to re-capture these dollars or what amount of this your practice will absorb.

Finally…looking on the bright side, these supply costs will come down as the supply and demand curve re-balance.