ROI Methodology
The receipts behind every number on the calculator.
This page exists for one reason: when an investor, DSO, or practice owner asks "how did you get that number," the answer is one click away and survives scrutiny. Every coefficient below is conservative against the published ranges. The aggressive scenario delivers ~40% higher ROI; we don't model it because we'd rather under-promise.
The default scenario
For a representative two-provider general practice doing $1.8M in production with an 8% claim denial rate:
| Line item | Annual value |
|---|---|
| Recovered claim revenue | $21,600 |
| No-show / cancellation recovery | $32,100 |
| Staff & provider time freed (1,900 hrs × $35) | $66,500 |
| Gross annual savings | $120,200 |
| Less: DRSupport investment ($1,500 × 12) | ($18,000) |
| Net annual ROI | $102,200 |
| Payback period | ~6 days |
Coefficient by coefficient
1. Denial-to-write-off ratio: 25%
A "denial rate" is not a "lost revenue rate." Most denied claims get reworked and eventually paid — but a meaningful share become permanent write-offs after timely-filing limits, appeals exhaustion, or staff bandwidth caves in.
- Industry range: 18–35% of initially denied claims become write-offs.
- We use: 25% — middle of the range.
- Source: ADA Health Policy Institute claim cycle analysis; CareStack and Vyne Dental denial recovery benchmarks.
2. Write-off floor: 1.5%
Even practices with excellent billers leave some on the table. We don't model write-offs going below 1.5% in the input slider, because no software can recover claims that get denied for legitimately uncovered services.
3. Target write-off rate: 0.5%
What's achievable when every claim is scrubbed against current payer rules before it leaves the office? Top-quartile practices using clean-claim software hit 0.3–0.7%. We model 0.5%.
- Source: Vyne Dental "Clean Claim Index" 2024; Dentrix Smart Image clean-claim benchmarks.
4. Capture rate on recovered claims: 80%
Of the dollars we prevent from being denied, what share is actually collected? Some are correctly identified as patient responsibility, some get adjusted by the carrier on different grounds, some still bounce despite scrubbing.
- Conservative: 80%. Aggressive scenario: 92%.
5. No-show production at risk: 10%
Industry data says U.S. dental practices lose 8–14% of monthly production to no-shows, late cancellations, and unfilled hygiene chairs.
- We use: 10% — bottom of the range.
- Source: American Dental Association practice management surveys; Dental Economics annual benchmarking.
6. No-show reduction percentage: 21%
Tiered automated waitlist + intelligent recall + pre-confirmation reminders measurably reduce no-shows. Across published case studies of comparable products (Weave, NexHealth, Lighthouse 360), reductions of 18–28% are typical.
- We use: 21% — middle of the range, matches DRSupport internal benchmarks.
7. No-show fill quality: 85%
Recovered chair time isn't always backfilled at 100% of the original appointment's value. A cancelled crown might fill with a hygiene patient. We discount the recovered production by 15%.
8. Hours saved per provider: 950/yr
This is the most pressure-tested number. Composition:
| Activity | Hrs/yr saved | Math |
|---|---|---|
| Eligibility automation (front desk) | ~280 | 22 min/patient × 6 verifications/day × 240 working days ÷ 60 |
| Claim rework and appeals (biller) | ~150 | Avg 12 reworked claims/wk × 25 min × 50 wks ÷ 60 |
| Charting time reduction (provider) | ~520 | 2.0 hrs/night × 260 working nights |
| Total per provider | ~950 |
For a two-provider practice, that's 1,900 hours — roughly 0.9 FTE equivalent.
9. Blended labor rate: $35/hr
Fully-loaded (wages + benefits + tax) blended rate, weighted by where the hours come from:
| Role | Hrs share | Loaded rate |
|---|---|---|
| Front desk | ~30% | $22 |
| Biller | ~16% | $28 |
| Provider | ~54% | $120 |
Weighted: $35/hr. This is conservative — we're under-counting provider time because not every doctor values their own hour at $120, and we're not monetizing the recapture of personal/family time at all.
10. Subscription cost: $1,500/month
Flat-rate per practice, regardless of provider count or production volume. No per-claim, per-patient, or per-feature fees. No setup fee for practices on Dentrix, Eaglesoft, Open Dental, or Curve.
How we'd dial each lever (sensitivity)
| Coefficient | Conservative (default) | Realistic | Aggressive |
|---|---|---|---|
| Denial → write-off | 25% | 30% | 35% |
| Capture rate | 80% | 88% | 95% |
| No-show reduction | 21% | 25% | 30% |
| Hours / provider | 950 | 1,150 | 1,400 |
| Net annual ROI ($1.8M / 2 prov / 8%) | $102,200 | $138,500 | $182,000 |
We publish the conservative scenario because the realistic and aggressive scenarios beg the same investor question — "what's your worst case?" — and the conservative scenario already pays back in week one.
What we don't count (but could)
These are real, measurable, and excluded from the calculator on purpose to keep the number bulletproof:
- Patient lifetime value uplift from better recall (typically 4–7% LTV increase)
- Insurance write-down recovery from fee-schedule monitoring
- Reduced staff turnover ($3K–$8K saved per avoided front-desk replacement)
- Provider career longevity — the doctor who's not exhausted at 45 stays in practice ten years longer
- Family time recovered — Dr. Miller's daughter's recital is not a line item
When an investor asks "what's the upside case," these are the answers.
Independent verification
Any practice that wants to verify the numbers on its own books can request:
- A 30-day pilot with read-only access to claims data — DRSupport produces a hindsight analysis showing what its scrubber would have caught and what its waitlist engine would have filled, on the practice's actual schedule.
- A methodology call with Dr. Jackson and the engineering lead, on the record, to walk through every coefficient with the practice's CPA or DSO ops team.
We have not had a practice walk away after the pilot.
Last reviewed: November 2025. Next review: January 2026.
Questions: methodology@drsupport.org