We are certain that, as parents, you share our goal of ensuring the best possible dental health for your children.  We recognize that in today's busy world, adhering to a schedule is important in order to maximize time and meet the demands of daily life.  With this in mind, we have developed our Office Policies to address questions that you may have.  Please review our policies and feel free to contact us for more information.

Hours of Operation  /   Open Office Policy   /  Appointment Scheduling 
Fee Payment & Insurance

Hours of Operation

Metairie Office
Monday - Friday:  7:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Houma Office
Monday, Tuesday, and Friday:  8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Emergencies: 
If an emergency arises after regular office hours you can reach Dr. Marvin Cavallino at (504) 259-4535 or (504) 738-6542 and Dr.Claudia Cavallino at (504) 251-2558.

Open Office Policy

Parents are welcome in the clinical area.

Back to Top

Appointment Scheduling,
Late Cancellations/Failed Appointments

Our patients are seen by appointment only.  Most often we are ready and able to see our patients within 5 minutes of the scheduled appointment time.  As a courtesy to you, we will call two days before your child's appointment as a confirmation.

Because this is a pediatric practice and most of our patients are in school, please be aware that it will be necessary to schedule some appointments during school hours.  We will certainly try to accommodate your child's school schedule as much as possible.

If your schedule changes and necessitates rescheduling the appointment, we ask that you kindly give us at least 24 hours notice.  When you reserve an appointment, you reserve our time, our facilities, and our attention.  Late cancellations (less than 24 hours notice) and failed appointments are disruptive to the schedule and other patients.  Valuable time is wasted and we are prevented from seeing other patients who may have wanted that appointment time.  It also prevents us from seeing emergency patients efficiently.  Consequently, late cancellations and failed appointments drive up the cost of dental care.  In the instance of a late cancellation or a failed appointment, we may ask that you reserve future appointments with a credit card and there may be a charge for a late cancellation or failed appointment.

We thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Back to Top

Fee Payment

Payment is expected on the day services are rendered unless other financial arrangements are made prior to the dental visit.  As forms of payment, we do accept cash, check, Mastercard, Visa, and travelers checks.  We also work with most non-PPO and non-DMO insurance plans.  If extensive or extended treatment is being rendered, we can arrange for a no-interest / low-interest monthly payment.

Insurance

As a courtesy, we will gladly file your insurance claim for you.  We will do all that we can to make sure you receive your maximum benefits from your insurance plan.  Deductibles, copayments, and portions that our office determines not payable by your insurance company are due on the day services are rendered.  You will be responsible for all charges incurred on your child's account which remain unpaid by your insurance company (for any reason) after 45 days.

Finally, you may have noticed that sometimes your insurance company reimbursed you at a lower rate than the fee you were actually charged.  Your insurance company may state that the dentist's fee was above the UCR ("usual and customary, or reasonable" fee).  This statement implies that the fee was unreasonable or well above what other dentists in the area charge for a certain service.  This is very misleading and inaccurate.  Insurance companies arbitrarily set their own fee schedule in order to make a profit.  These fee schedules differ greatly amongst insurance companies and the majority of insurance companies will not provide our office with their UCR fee schedule.  Therefore, we can only estimate what your insurance company will pay for services.

Back to Top