Comfort Dental partnerships

[Aerogirl7210]

Well hi all! I've been browsing these posts for months. What a truly interesting and informative board! Anyhow, I'm a pre-dental student and I'm trying to find out all the information that I possibly can about the field of dentistry. Does anyone know anything about "chain" dental offices (don't know what you'd call it professionally--new at all this ). Comfort Dental has offices throughout Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. They advertise that they need more partners and that their partners are paid in the top 5 highest percent of all dentists. How can they be in need of partners with such a high salary? Granted not everyone is in it for the money I know. Maybe this is a dumb question to all you who know the ins and outs of this whole business but I figured somebody could answer it. Basically I just want to know more about this way of dentistry and advantages/disadvantages etc.

Thanks so much guys!

Shannon

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[UBTom]

These chains are known as Dental Management Service Organizations (DMSOs).

There may be several problems with entering into a contract with a DMSO:

- Some DMSOs might charge the practitioner a "management fee," which would be extra overhead cost for the practitioner.

- Some DMSOs might not provide enough management so you end up with many of the same duties, including quality control.

- Loss of autonomy/management authority.

- Not clear who makes the treatment decisions-- Dentists or non-dentist stockholders if the DMSO is a publically-traded company?

- Restrictive covenants-- If you leave the DMSO to strike out on your own, they can enforce ridiculous restrictive covenants if they own a large number of chains in a town, i.e. you agree not to practice within X miles of any of the chain locations for a Y number of years. You would be effectively run out of town.

These are some of the problems mentioned in the practice management class here at my school. Personally, I think DMSOs are bad news and I'm steering clear of them after I graduate.

 

[Aerogirl7210]

Tom,

Thanks so much for your prompt reply! I knew there was something about it that didn't seem to add up!

Shannon