Open Dental Forum

Hey everyone,

It's been a WHILE since I've been on here.

I'm rolling out the new Ortho Case feature company wide and am curious if there is anyone out there who has already started using the ortho case feature?https://opendental.com/manual/orthocase.html
I want to use it alongside Dynamic Payment Plans that will use recurring credit card charges. We see ortho patients every seven weeks and recognize that revenue at the time of service and want to allocate any payments that are in excess of the current production as Unearned Income.

I have no doubt we'll figure it out but I thought it was worth asking if anyone here is already playing around with these features??

Okay, so I figured out Ortho Cases and they're pretty slick. I'm going to put in some feedback for enhancements that will make it usable in the long term, but all in all it solves a massive market gap for Ortho.

I'll pop back in tomorrow to share my workflows because I really want to see this feature get used. It's incredibly useful for DSOs who need a mechanism for revenue recognition and in house financing that can be easily tracked to also incorporate doctor pay.

Alright, so I meant to do this sooner...



The Ortho case is a really great way to track the progression of treatment and to recognize revenue on a schedule that makes sense for you per visit. As each of the periodic visits are completed, Open Dental will assign the fee from the schedule to that procedure code and the entry in the Ortho Case turns green to show it's completion.

Things that will be useful to add:
1. Provide a way to "roll up" all remaining production in to the debond code. For cases that end early or for patients who miss visits, there is currently no way to recognize that revenue within this Ortho Case Tool (that I can figure out at least).
2. Analytics/Reporting.
* Total Case Fee Vs. Recognized Revenue (Production)
* For Insured patients, a way to differentiate "Insurance Overpayments"
3. Tighter Payment Plan integration. Dynamic Payment Plans may solve this, but there is a need to have the full case fee stated at the start of the payment plan and a mechanism to track the production, as payment schedules may get ahead of production schedules *(we collect every 4 weeks and see patients every 7 weeks). Currently Dynamic Payment Plans only allow for completed production to be added. We can't treatment plan ahead of time because we use appointment types to add procedures to patient charts when they schedule.

For now, we are setting up recurring charges to "Run Charge even if no family balance is present" and ensuring we have a stop date for those charges. I'm going to think a little more about the advantages of manually adding treatment credits to payment plans as opposed to allowing the Dynamic Pay Plan handle it for us. I am struggling to figure out how to transition away from the control that comes with setting the full case fee and schedule at the beginning of treatment and losing that visibility to transition across to dynamic plans.

If anyone else is ever trying to roll this feature out, feel free to reach out. I'll happily help.

Dear Arna,

the way you describe dynamic payment plans is not how I understand them. Ortho cases take a long time. The new ortho case feature now allows for planned visits and pay per visit. This way procedures may be attributed to providers the usual way (provider payment by production).

Another way to set up an ortho treatment plan is to agree on a fixed price and a monthly payment schedule resulting in doctors payments by collection. Since production doesn't matter in this case you can set the ortho procedure (e.g. D8080, D8090) complete right after bonding and attach a dynamic payment plan to this procedure (you play bank and the patient payment go to the payment plan and not the treatment. Payments to payment plans are attributed to providers!). Periodic ortho visits (D8670) will then be free of charge since they have been prepaid. This is also beneficial if the insurance company allows for one-time claim filing at the beginning of the treatment instead of submitting a claim for each and every visit. The dynamic part of the payment plan kicks in when the insurance pays its share to the office if estimated insurance payments were not taken into account in the beginning.

Given these options it would be advisable to clarify in-house if orthodontic provider payment is by collection or production, if patient payments should be on a monthly basis or per visit and if the insurance payment goes to the patient or the office.

By our experience, orthodontists get a higher percentage if paid by collection because of the risk of non-payment by the patient is shifted to them. This is why all offices in our area pay providers for ortho cases by collection.

Joerg