Setting up general options

On the General Options tab of the Preferences dialog box, you can choose a payment/adjustment default by selecting Family or Current Patient under Payment/Adjustment Options. All payments and adjustments made from this workstation will default to the option selected.

From the Payment/Adjustments Options list, you can set the default for payment allocations and adjustments. The following options are available:

·       Provider

·        Split By Provider - Splits payment by provider. If you select this option, you cannot split payments by family member.

·        To Guarantor’s Primary Provider - Applies payment to the account guarantor's primary provider.

·       Patient

·        Family Account - Applies a payment to a family account

·        Current Patient - Applies a payment to the current patient.

·        Split By Family Members - Applies a payment to the oldest family balance and posts it to the guarantor's ledger. If you select this option, you cannot split payments by provider.

·       Split Method

·        Percentage Payments/Adjustments - Divides the payments and adjustments among the providers according to the provider’s percentage of the total amount owed.

·        FIFO [First In First Out] - Applies the payment toward the oldest completed procedures first.

·        Guarantor Estimate - Applies the payment to providers who have balances as guarantor estimates and ignores provider balances that Dentrix estimates insurance will pay the remainder of.

·        Equal Payments/Adjustments - Splits payment and adjustment amounts equally among all providers with debit balances.

·        Do not auto-allocate to inactive providers - Select to prevent credit balances from being allocated automatically to providers that you have inactivated.

·        Payment Agreement Settings - Click to open the Payment Agreement Settings dialog box and apply payment agreement default settings to the Enter Payment dialog box.

·        Always select by default for payments when family has active payment agreement (Default) - If selected and saved or if no setting is saved for the Apply to Payment Agreement Default for Enter Payment setting, the Apply to Payment Agreement checkbox in the Enter Payment dialog box is selected by default if an active payment agreement exists for the family/guarantor regardless of where the Enter Payment dialog box is opened from.

·        Only select by default for payments entered from payment agreement or Payment Agreement Manager - If selected and saved, the Apply to Payment Agreement checkbox in the Enter Payment dialog box defaults to selected ONLY when the Enter Payment dialog box is opened from the Billing/Payment Agreement Information dialog box from the various locations in Dentrix OR from the Payment Agreement Manager if there is an active payment agreement for the family/guarantor.

Show Close Message - By default, each time you attempt to close the Patient Chart, Perio Chart, Treatment Planner, Document Center, and Questionnaires modules, a message box appears and informs you that if you minimize the module, it displays more quickly the next time you try to access it. You can disable this message for any or all of the modules mentioned by clearing the option that corresponds to the modules for which you do not want the message to be displayed.

Under Startup Options, you have the following options:

·        Automatic Updates Settings - Click this button to set up how you want to download and install updates to Dentrix.

·        System Startup Settings - Click this button to select which items you want to start automatically when start or restart the computer.

·        Automatically Launch Office Journal - Select to launch the Office Journal automatically when you start Dentrix.

Under Additional Options, you have the following options:

·        Instances of Treatment Planner - If needed, type the number of instances of the Treatment Planner module (and consequently, the Presenter, too) that can be opened at one time in the text field provided. The default value is 4.

·        Perio Beep on Entry - Select to indicate that you want Dentrix to beep using the computer’s speakers after every pocket depth entry in the Perio Chart.

·        Suspend Patient Alerts - Select if you want to ignore all Patient Alerts on this computer.

·        Suspend Treatment Area Flags - Select if you want to ignore all the treatment area flags assigned in the Procedure Code Editor. (For more information, click Procedure code setup.)

·        Suspend Referral Print Reminders - When procedures are set complete from the Appointment Book, Chart, or Ledger that have been referred to the practice by another provider, a message box automatically appears and asks if you want to print a Referral Recap. Select this option to disable this type of message.

·        Hide Patient SIN - Protects your patients’ privacy by masking or hiding their Social Insurance Numbers in Dentrix and preventing them from printing on Payment Plan Coupons, select this option. With this option selected, the list becomes active. Select one of the following from the list:

·        Hide Completely - Removes the number from view (the Social Insurance Number field appears blank.)

·        Mask Completely - Replaces the digits of the number with the number symbol (#)

·        Mask All but Last 4 Numbers - Replaces the first five digits with the number symbol (#) but displays the last four digits

Note: You can still view the Social Insurance Number from the Patient Information dialog box in the Family File and the Update Patient Information dialog box in the Questionnaires module.

·        Set default dentition to primary for all new patients - Select a default age for primary dentition in the Chart. When you create a new patient record, any patients below the age you specify will have primary dentition set in the Chart by default. This setting will not affect current patients in your database; the setting will only be applied to new patients.

·        Use Simple Select Patient in All Modules – Select to use the simple Select Patient dialog box rather than the advanced Select Patient dialog box on the computer you are using.

·        Automatically Launch Select Patient - (Default) Opens the Select Patient dialog box automatically for those Dentrix modules that require you to select a patient.

·        Auto View Patient Note in Family File - Select to view patient notes in the Family File automatically.

·        Require Referred By for new patients - Select to require a referral source before you can add a new patient in the Family File or make a new patient appointment.

Default Signature on File for New Subscribers - Set the following options for Dental Insurance:

·        Release of Information - Select to have Release of Information selected by default when adding insurance to a subscriber in the Family File.

·        Assignment of Benefits - Select to have Assignment of Benefits selected by default when adding insurance to a subscriber in the Family File.