The 4 Dental Practice Processes Worth Automating
Not every administrative task in a dental practice is a good automation candidate. The four below are. They are time-sensitive, rule-based, high-frequency, and directly tied to production. Each one runs on the same patient data your practice already has inside Dentrix or Eaglesoft.
1. Appointment Reminder Automation
Dental no-show rates average 15–20% for practices that rely on manual reminder calls. Most front desk coordinators can make 15–20 reminder calls per day — which is nowhere near sufficient for a full schedule. The calls that do not get made become the no-shows that cost you production.
The math is straightforward: 80 appointments per month at a 15% no-show rate is 12 missed appointments. At $175 average production per visit, that is $2,100 per month in lost revenue from patients who were already booked and simply did not show. Automated reminders consistently reduce no-show rates by 30–50% in practices that implement a proper 3-touch sequence.
The 3-touch reminder sequence: Confirmation immediately when the appointment is scheduled. A 48-hour reminder with a confirm or cancel option. A same-day reminder 2 hours before. Each touch reduces no-show probability. Together, they routinely cut no-show rates to under 8% — and cancellations that do come in early enough get flagged automatically so your front desk can fill the slot from a waitlist.
How automated appointment reminders work:
Step 1 Appointment scheduled in Dentrix or Eaglesoft → Step 2 Confirmation SMS sent immediately with appointment details → Step 3 48-hour reminder sent with one-tap confirm or cancel option → Step 4 Same-day reminder sent 2 hours before appointment → Step 5 Cancellations flagged automatically → front desk notified to fill slot from waitlist
2. Patient Reactivation Campaigns
Most dental practices have 300–500 patients who have not returned in 18 months or more. At $175 average production per visit and one visit per year, that is $52,500–$87,500 in potential annual revenue sitting dormant in your own patient database. These are not strangers — they are people who trusted your practice enough to become patients. They simply drifted.
Automated reactivation identifies every patient overdue for recall and runs a multi-touch outreach sequence on your behalf. Patients who book are immediately removed from the sequence. Those who do not respond after three contacts are tagged for manual review. A well-executed reactivation campaign typically brings back 8–15% of contacted patients — with no additional marketing spend on new patient acquisition.
Step 1 Patient identified as 18+ months since last visit in Dentrix or Eaglesoft → Step 2 SMS or email outreach sent at week 1 with personalized recall message and online scheduling link → Step 3 Follow-up message sent at week 3 if no response → Step 4 Final outreach at week 6 → Step 5 Patient books via online scheduling link → sequence stops automatically → Step 6 Non-responders tagged for review or archived
3. Post-Visit Review Request
Online reviews are the first thing prospective new patients check before calling a dental practice. Research from BrightLocal (2024) found that 78% of patients trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends. A practice with 4.9 stars at 200+ reviews will capture the first call from a patient searching "dentist near me" before any other consideration enters the picture.
The problem is timing and consistency. Dentists and hygienists deliver excellent care — then the patient leaves, the day moves on, and no one sends the review request. For the few practices that do ask, it is typically done inconsistently via a front desk verbal request that patients say yes to and then forget. Automation fixes both problems: the request goes out at exactly the right moment, every time, with a direct link that makes leaving a review a 30-second action.
Stars matter at scale: A practice averaging 4.9 stars at 250 reviews versus a competitor at 4.3 stars at 40 reviews will receive dramatically more new patient inquiries — not because the care is necessarily better, but because social proof compounds. Every automated review request is a deposit into a compounding reputation asset.
Step 1 Appointment marked completed in Dentrix or Eaglesoft → Step 2 2-hour delay (patient has had time to get home and settle) → Step 3 Satisfaction check SMS sent: "How was your visit today?" → Step 4 Happy patients (positive response) routed directly to Google review link → Step 5 Unhappy patients routed to private feedback form (practice receives it; public review is not requested)
4. Treatment Plan Follow-Up
Unaccepted treatment plans represent one of the largest and most overlooked revenue leaks in dentistry. Industry estimates consistently put unaccepted treatment at 40–60% of diagnosed work. Patients hear the diagnosis, say they will think about it, and then the practice never follows up because the front desk is managing the phone, check-ins, and checkout simultaneously.
Treatment plan follow-up automation tracks every patient who has a presented but unscheduled treatment plan and sends a time-based sequence of reminders with a direct scheduling link. The sequence is gentle and professional — not a hard sell. Most patients who do not book immediately do want the treatment; they simply need a convenient nudge and an easy path to scheduling. Automation provides both, at exactly the right intervals, without any staff time.
The revenue math: A practice that diagnoses $30,000 in treatment per month with 50% acceptance leaves $15,000 per month unscheduled. Improving case acceptance from 50% to 60% — a realistic outcome from consistent, well-timed follow-up — recovers $3,000 per month in production from work that was already diagnosed and presented.
Step 1 Treatment plan presented in Dentrix or Eaglesoft with no appointment booked → Step 2 7-day delay with no booking detected → Step 3 Automated follow-up email or SMS with scheduling link and brief summary of recommended treatment → Step 4 14-day second touch if still no booking → Step 5 30-day final reminder → Step 6 Patient books → sequence stops automatically; appointment confirmed
What Does Dental Automation Cost?
Every build at Aplos AI is priced at a flat rate of $150/hr, scoped in hours before we start. No hourly billing surprises. No ongoing monthly retainers. You pay once for the build; you own it.
| Automation | Estimated Hours | Flat-Rate Range |
|---|---|---|
| Appointment Reminder Sequence | 20–30 hrs | $3,000–$4,500 |
| Patient Reactivation Campaign | 30–45 hrs | $4,500–$6,750 |
| Post-Visit Review Request | 20–25 hrs | $3,000–$3,750 |
| Treatment Plan Follow-Up | 25–35 hrs | $3,750–$5,250 |
Payback timeline: Recovering just 5 no-shows per month at $175 average production recovers $875 per month. An appointment reminder build at $3,000–$4,500 pays back in 3–5 months — and continues recovering revenue indefinitely after that. The reactivation campaign math is even stronger: reactivating 30 lapsed patients from a 300-patient dormant list at $175 per visit generates $5,250 from a single campaign run.
Does This Replace Dentrix or Eaglesoft?
No. We connect to your existing system. If you have Dentrix and Twilio and Gmail, we build the automation layer that makes them work together without anyone on your staff manually triggering a single message. You keep every tool you already pay for. No new platforms. No new logins for your team to manage.
The automation layer runs on n8n — an open-source workflow automation tool that operates as the bridge between your practice management software and your communication channels. It runs on your own infrastructure, which means patient data stays within your systems. This matters for HIPAA compliance, and we review the data handling approach with you before any build begins.
Every automation we deliver is documented, diagrammed, and fully handed off. Your team understands what runs, when it runs, and what to do if anything needs to change. You are not dependent on us to keep the lights on.
What the Delivery Looks Like
From signed scope to live automation, most dental practice builds are delivered in 1–2 weeks. Here is exactly what that includes:
Loom video walkthrough — recorded for your team so every front desk coordinator and office manager understands what the automation does, what triggers it, and what to expect when it runs. No live training sessions required.
Written handoff document — covers how each automation works, how to troubleshoot common issues, what to do if Dentrix or Eaglesoft changes an API endpoint, and where to find the logic if you want to modify a message or timing later.
Full access and ownership — everything runs in your accounts, on your infrastructure. No proprietary portals to log into. No recurring fees to us. You own the automation outright from day one.
On your end, we need: API access to your practice management software and communication tools, and approximately one hour for a final walkthrough to confirm everything works correctly with your real patient data and scheduling environment.
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