Treatment plans over several visits: book the series upfront

When a treatment runs over several visits, book the series with the patient at the start, from your calendar, each visit in the service that matches its length. An implant, an orthodontic treatment or a course of gum treatment has steps you can foresee: placement, check, final restoration; bonding, adjustments; one quadrant after another. Setting the dates together means the patient leaves with a plan in writing, and you keep long chair time for the steps that need it.

Steps and lengths are examples: use your own protocols. On Book, each step can be a service with its own name, description and price, and each slot belongs to one service with its own start and end. That way a 90-minute placement and a 20-minute check never share a slot length.

Patients shouldn't book an implant placement or a bonding session on their own. Open online only the consultation that starts the process, and book the later steps yourself. Book has no hidden services, so the simple method is to create the slots for a treatment step when you plan it, and book the patient into them straight away. A slot with one place disappears from your public page as soon as it's booked.

At the end of the consultation or the first treatment visit, agree the dates with the patient and create each booking: first and last name are required, email and phone optional. Enter their email so they receive a confirmation for each visit, with a calendar file. Book doesn't send reminders, so these dates in the patient's calendar are what keep the plan on track.

Healing times and lab delays set the rhythm. Before booking the next step, check that your slots exist far enough ahead: create them and repeat them on the chosen weekdays until an end date beyond the longest gap in your plans. If the lab needs a set number of working days, count them before offering a date.

Orthodontic treatment can run for months, with short adjustment visits at regular intervals. For those, you can let patients book online: open a block of short adjustment slots after school hours and on some mornings, repeated on the chosen weekdays until an end date, and describe the service as "for patients already in treatment". Parents can book in their own name and write the child's first name in the note. Keep longer visits, such as bonding or removal, as services you book yourself, so they never land in a short slot.

At each adjustment, you can also book the next one before the patient leaves, so the interval you want is kept.

When you book a step, add a planning note such as "implant 2/4, check" or "ortho, adjustment". The note shows in the booking, in the new booking email and in the calendar file the patient receives, so keep clinical details in your records. The note helps you and your assistant prepare the right tray and instruments.

A late lab delivery or slower healing can move a step. Reschedule it from your bookings list, check the following steps still fit, and call the patient: Book doesn't email patients about changes, and patients can't reschedule online. If the whole plan shifts, move each visit and confirm the new dates in one call.

Book costs €5/month, everything included: unlimited bookings and services, no commission, no contract. Quotes, payments and records stay in your practice software.