A test, not a pitch
Take the 7pm Test.
You've probably been told your practice “has AI now.” Maybe it does. Here's how to find out tonight, in three minutes, without a vendor on the line — including us. We're not on the call. Your phone is.
Wait until the front desk goes home
Tonight, after close. No vendor on the line, nobody watching. This only works if it's the real conditions a patient meets.
Call your own main number — as a patient
The number on your website. Ask the two things every new patient asks: what a consultation costs, and when you could come in.
Try to book a consult. Time it.
Three minutes. Either you end the call with a confirmed appointment — a real slot, a confirmation text — or you don't.
How to score it
What passing sounds like
- Something picks up within a few rings — at 7pm, at 11pm, on Sunday
- It answers the price question with your prices, not a deflection
- It offers real times from a real calendar
- You hang up with a booked consult and a confirmation text
What “having AI” usually sounds like
- Voicemail, with office hours read out loud
- Ringing through to a staff member's personal cell
- A website chatbot that says “thanks — someone will reach out” and emails the enquiry to an inbox that opens at 9am
- You never find out what a consult costs, and neither does the patient
The gap between those two columns is invisible from inside the practice. Your days are full, the phone rings at 10am, and everyone who set it up tells you it's handled. The only time the gap is visible is after hours — which is exactly when a working patient calls.
Two more, while you're at it
Two minutes · compliance
The Inbox Test
Open your email and search for a recent enquiry from your own website. If patient names and phone numbers arrive as ordinary emails, ask one question in writing: whose Business Associate Agreement covers that inbox? A person asking about a procedure is protected health information. “My web guy checked and we're fine” is an answer about his tools — not about your inbox, your forwarding rules, or your liability. Get it in writing and see what comes back.
The five-minute stack audit →Five minutes · money
The One-Number Test
Ask whoever runs your marketing for one number: how many dollars in booked procedures did last month's ads produce? Not clicks, not calls, not “leads” — dollars. If the answer takes more than five minutes or arrives as a call-volume chart, nobody knows. And if nobody knows, your ad budget is being steered by the wrong number.
Why call counts mislead →If you passed all three: keep what you have.
We mean it. A practice that answers at 7pm, holds patient data under a signed BAA, and knows last month's ad revenue in dollars doesn't need us. If the call went to voicemail, the next question is how often that happens — and that one has an exact answer: the free 30-day loss audit counts every call, text, and form that got no reply, on your own traffic, without changing anything you run.
Common questions
- What is the 7pm Test?
- Call your own practice after hours, exactly as a new patient would, and try to book a consultation within three minutes. If you can't, neither can the patient who just saw your ad — and whatever you've been told about your practice “having AI,” the after-hours phone is where the truth lives. It costs nothing and requires no vendor.
- We have a chatbot on our website — doesn't that count as AI?
- It's AI in the way a doorbell is a receptionist. A typical website chatbot collects a name and number and emails it to your front desk — the patient still waits until morning, and in this market the patient usually books with whoever answered at 7pm. Nobody misled you: a chatbot is technically AI. It's just not the part that answers the phone, books the consult, or makes money.
- Our web vendor says our setup is HIPAA compliant. Isn't that settled?
- Ask for it in writing, specifically: which vendors touch patient names and numbers, and whose Business Associate Agreement covers each one — including the email inbox your website leads arrive in. Your vendor may be entirely right. But the liability sits with your practice either way, so the answer belongs on paper with your practice's name on it, not in a reassurance.
- What if my practice passes all three tests?
- Then keep what you have — sincerely. A practice that answers after hours, keeps patient data under a signed BAA, and can state last month's ad revenue in dollars has the exact machinery PracticeWide provides, and we'd be selling you a second one. Most practices pass one of the three. Almost none pass the first.
The $0 30-day loss audit
The next step is a count, not a contract.
For thirty days, the audit runs quietly on the calls, texts, and website enquiries you already get. Nothing you run changes. At the end: a one-page count of what got no answer and what it was likely worth in booked procedures. $0, no commitment, and a Business Associate Agreement signed before it touches anything.