Could a general dentist make the most?

[btpayne13]

Is it true that OMFS's make the most money, or could a general dentist who owns their own practice make more? I was just thinking that they would see more patients and have more business opportunities. Or am I completely wrong?

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[cadds]

Is it true that OMFS's make the most money, or could a general dentist who owns their own practice make more? I was just thinking that they would see more patients and have more business opportunities. Or am I completely wrong?

OMFS makes more , unless you have multiple dental offices, or a big office where you hire specialists

 

[dentalWorks]

Is it true that OMFS's make the most money, or could a general dentist who owns their own practice make more? I was just thinking that they would see more patients and have more business opportunities. Or am I completely wrong?

I can only speak about 1 case that I am very familiar with. My sister (general DDS) opened her office (brand new, build it from scratch... literally land ---> dental office) in summer of 2008. From what my father said, her tax papers showed she brought home a little over 420k (pre-tax) in 2009 I am talking 420k AFTER lab fees / worker fees were paid

Okay thats not the craziest part. She only works 3.5 days a week, 3 days for about 8-9 hours and 1/2 day for 5 hours.... less than 40 hours a week

 

[somethinpositiv]

My family dentist makes $700K pretax with 1 dental office. He hired 1 other general dentist, 1 orthodontist, 1 hygienist, 1 office manager, and like 10-15 dental assistants (usually 5 work on any given day).

What's the difference though, in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream 😉

 

[KlingonDentist]

My family dentist makes $700K pretax with 1 dental office. He hired 1 other general dentist, 1 orthodontist, 1 hygienist, 1 office manager, and like 10-15 dental assistants (usually 5 work on any given day).

What's the difference though, in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream 😉

You're wrong.

anything over $200k(single) or $250K (married) means you're getting reamed by Obama's plan to tax you to death. It is not worth working hard in this country anymore. The govt is incentivizing laziness with welfare and discouraging hard work. What backward thinking!

 

[dentalWorks]

You're wrong.

anything over $200k(single) or $250K (married) means you're getting reamed by Obama's plan to tax you to death. It is not worth working hard in this country anymore. The govt is incentivizing laziness with welfare and discouraging hard work. What backward thinking!

yes, making more than 250k means you'll be paying more taxes than you used to, but its not like its going to put you in the poor house.... your still (even after obama's new taxes) going to pocket a FAT amount, maybe not as fat as before, but still considerably higher than majority of the population

 

[Palmetto914]

Come on, guys! Let's not turn this into another political thread...

 

[charlestweed]

The OMFS’s make more per day. In less than 6 hours, an OMFS can see 8 patients for wisdom teeth extraction and the average fee is about $2500/case…..you can do the math to figure out how much they make in a day. To make the same amount in a day, the GP would have to see 4-5 times as many patients (if he/she has that many patients), hire 1-2 associate GPs, have more dental assistants, and work 8+hours.

The OMFS’s may not have enough patients to fill their appt book 5 days a week but with the amount of $$$ they can make in a day, 2-3 days/week should be enough for them. The 2 surgeons, whom I regularly send my patients to, only work 3 days (some days are only in the morning...they have the whole afternoon off) at their practices. To earn extra income, one of them works 5 days/month for the same corporate office that I currently work for.

 

[KlingonDentist]

yes, making more than 250k means you'll be paying more taxes than you used to, but its not like its going to put you in the poor house.... your still (even after obama's new taxes) going to pocket a FAT amount, maybe not as fat as before, but still considerably higher than majority of the population

You missed my point.

I did not say he's going to put me in the poor house. What I did way was it discourages people from wanting to work harder to earn more.

 

[btpayne13]

Please, let's leave politics out of this. It has no reason to be mentioned in this thread.

I see that OMFS's make more strictly on a per hour basis, but aren't there more opportunities in general dent if you have business acumen? What dentalWorks was saying was very impressive, talking about earnings of $420k after only the first year.

 

[armorshell]

Please, let's leave politics out of this. It has no reason to be mentioned in this thread.

I see that OMFS's make more strictly on a per hour basis, but aren't there more opportunities in general dent if you have business acumen? What dentalWorks was saying was very impressive, talking about earnings of $420k after only the first year.

And that anecdote and $5.50 will get you a latte. On average the oral surgeon will make more, and for every general dentist with business acumen there will be an oral surgeon with equal business acumen.

 

[robg]

But an oral surgeon pays more for malpractice ins and the additional years of tuition (unless they got a stipend), and additional years of loan intest.

 

[8 SNAKE]

But an oral surgeon pays more for malpractice ins and the additional years of tuition (unless they got a stipend), and additional years of loan intest.

You could say the same things while comparing a dentist and an accountant. Everything that you said is true, but all of those expenses are easily overcome by the increased income of the typical oral surgeon.

 

[Guy Smiley]

And that anecdote and $5.50 will get you a latte. On average the oral surgeon will make more, and for every general dentist with business acumen there will be an oral surgeon with equal business acumen.

While that is true, how many oral surgeons can open a bunch of chain surgery offices? I think the average surgeon will make more, but general has the most potenial if you can open a bunch of practices and staff them with associates.

 

[1992Corolla]

While that is true, how many oral surgeons can open a bunch of chain surgery offices? I think the average surgeon will make more, but general has the most potenial if you can open a bunch of practices and staff them with associates.

Can an oral surgeon not open multiple offices and produce the same desired results you speak of?

 

[armorshell]

While that is true, how many oral surgeons can open a bunch of chain surgery offices? I think the average surgeon will make more, but general has the most potenial if you can open a bunch of practices and staff them with associates.

Is there any reason an oral surgeon can't "open a bunch of practices and staff them with associates (associate general dentists)?

 

[dentalWorks]

Is there any reason an oral surgeon can't "open a bunch of practices and staff them with associates (associate general dentists)?

Im sure the OMFS can, but while the OMFS guy was doing his 4-6 year residency, the GP had a head start not only on making a decent income, but more importantly, learning how to run a GP practice. IMO, with the right business mentality (and I know I speak of a very small minority of GPs) no healthcare profession out there can reach the potential of a strong GP business man. Sure the OMFS will finish his residency and start making 300-400k a year, but he has to first learn how to run his practice before he goes on and open multiple branches.

This is just 1 case I know off, my sisters old boss retired about 10 years ago. He owned 8 GP practices and sold them all at once to some company (all this happend about 10 years back). I guess sitting home on a pile of money bored him, so about 3 years ago he came off of retirement and started to open GP practices again, right now, my sister tells me he is in the process of opening his 4th GP. He tells her he is going to do this until he dies.

 

[Regmata]

Im sure the OMFS can, but while the OMFS guy was doing his 4-6 year residency, the GP had a head start not only on making a decent income, but more importantly, learning how to run a GP practice. IMO, with the right business mentality (and I know I speak of a very small minority of GPs) no healthcare profession out there can reach the potential of a strong GP business man. Sure the OMFS will finish his residency and start making 300-400k a year, but he has to first learn how to run his practice before he goes on and open multiple branches.

This is just 1 case I know off, my sisters old boss retired about 10 years ago. He owned 8 GP practices and sold them all at once to some company (all this happend about 10 years back). I guess sitting home on a pile of money bored him, so about 3 years ago he came off of retirement and started to open GP practices again, right now, my sister tells me he is in the process of opening his 4th GP. He tells her he is going to do this until he dies.

Wow...you should just skip dental school and broker practice transitions, he could be your #1 client and you'd be RICH

 

[setdoc7]

GP's with great business sense can do better because of the 4-6 year head start and decreased outlay of funds (med school) over that time as well as the increased salary. But they must be aggressive and willing to take risks. Most of my GPR's are not so inclined due to their hi debt and percieved inability to run a practice. Only one of my recent grads has gone directly from GPR into his own office. He is pulling down 500K+, which is pretty good after 1 year. It can be done, but it is a lot of work. Like anything else in business ( I own several non dental related businesses, as well as a private practice), it takes a lot of work, but the benefits are rewarding.
Oh, and not all OMFS privates are pulling down those great fees either. I know plenty who work for peanuts. It's like everything else in dentistry, some do better than others, but there are no guarantees.

 

[DrReo]

GP's with great business sense can do better because of the 4-6 year head start and decreased outlay of funds (med school) over that time as well as the increased salary. But they must be aggressive and willing to take risks. Most of my GPR's are not so inclined due to their hi debt and percieved inability to run a practice. Only one of my recent grads has gone directly from GPR into his own office. He is pulling down 500K+, which is pretty good after 1 year. It can be done, but it is a lot of work. Like anything else in business ( I own several non dental related businesses, as well as a private practice), it takes a lot of work, but the benefits are rewarding.
Oh, and not all OMFS privates are pulling down those great fees either. I know plenty who work for peanuts. It's like everything else in dentistry, some do better than others, but there are no guarantees.

500k Net?

What other type of business have you invested in?

 

[1992Corolla]

Im sure the OMFS can, but while the OMFS guy was doing his 4-6 year residency, the GP had a head start not only on making a decent income, but more importantly, learning how to run a GP practice. IMO, with the right business mentality (and I know I speak of a very small minority of GPs) no healthcare profession out there can reach the potential of a strong GP business man. Sure the OMFS will finish his residency and start making 300-400k a year, but he has to first learn how to run his practice before he goes on and open multiple branches.

This is just 1 case I know off, my sisters old boss retired about 10 years ago. He owned 8 GP practices and sold them all at once to some company (all this happend about 10 years back). I guess sitting home on a pile of money bored him, so about 3 years ago he came off of retirement and started to open GP practices again, right now, my sister tells me he is in the process of opening his 4th GP. He tells her he is going to do this until he dies.

But he can still open multiple satellite offices and do the same thing.

 

[xhamburgersamx]

You can't just open practices left and right. First you need to have the right debt:income ratio before you can borrow enough to open a practice. If it was so easy to open 10 practices and earn a mill/year why aren't tens of thosuands of GP's doing it?

 

[armorshell]

GP's with great business sense can do better because of the 4-6 year head start and decreased outlay of funds (med school) over that time as well as the increased salary.

Actually, including the 4-6 years of falling behind, and the outlay of additional funds for med school, the internal rate of return for doing a residency in OMFS is about 25% when compared to an average general dentist.

Again, setting aside everyone imagining about their amazing business prowess (We are talking about pre-dents and dental students, the majority of whom have no clue about business aside from the Hollywood Video they were assistant manager at during high school), ON AVERAGE, the OMFS will do significantly better financially over their lifetime.

http://jada.highwire.org/cgi/content/abstract/132/12/1679

 

[KlingonDentist]

Actually, including the 4-6 years of falling behind, and the outlay of additional funds for med school, the internal rate of return for doing a residency in OMFS is about 25% when compared to an average general dentist.

Again, setting aside everyone imagining about their amazing business prowess (We are talking about pre-dents and dental students, the majority of whom have no clue about business aside from the Hollywood Video they were assistant manager at during high school), ON AVERAGE, the OMFS will do significantly better financially over their lifetime.

http://jada.highwire.org/cgi/content...ct/132/12/1679

That was an interesting study and I believe the results.
However now is almost a decade later and that data may be outdated.
Although one can assume that OS still leads the pack in terms of ROI the current economic conditions may reduce the rate of just slightly lower.

Especially with Orthodontists the rate of return may be negative now. ie. One may make more as a GP on average than an orthodontist or at least equal statistically.

 

[btpayne13]

This is a bit off topic, but it has to do with the issue of more time spent in school for oral surgeons. I did some researching, and there's a doctor in my area that did 18 years of school after high school (including undergrad, dental school, OMFS residency, med school, general surgery residency, plastic surgery residency, and craniofacial and pediatric plastic surgery fellowship - HOLY CRAP). Isn't that overkill? Unless that's what you really want to do, that seems like way too much time in school. Would I be right in assuming that this much schooling would have you making less than a general dentist or OMFS?

 

[phungy]

Bill Dorfman is a cosmetic GP in LA and makes close to 9 digits.

 

[btpayne13]

Bill Dorfman is a cosmetic GP in LA and makes close to 9 digits.

Does GP mean he didn't do a residency? Just DDS or DMD?

 

[dentalWorks]

Bill Dorfman is a cosmetic GP in LA and makes close to 9 digits.

9 digits ?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
You realize 1 million is 1,000,000 (7 digits only)

 

[UKdent]

Just curious, yes OMFS can make more per day/procedure, but why cant GP do some wizzy ext. Yea you will pay a little more malpractice especially if you are certified for conscious sedation. Most dentist in my town performs all their own ext including wizzy. Yea at first you will be slower at it, but you can pick up the speed like anything you do enough of, or you can always apply for a 1 year internship at an OMFS residency. It all about what you feel comfortable doing. You get the best of both world, you can stay busy with your restorative and when you have a 17 yr old that needs 3rds out you can do it. You can still refer if you need to, most all that is referred is when the IAN is wrapped around the root and you dont wanna mess with the consequences of paresthesia, dysesthesia, etc. due to the fact that there is only 1 OMFS and he is only in town 1 day a week. You dont have to limit yourself, just go to dentaltown and look at Dr. Tommy Murphs thread on OMFS section, a general dentist that performs alot of exodontia.

 

[setdoc7]

Actually, including the 4-6 years of falling behind, and the outlay of additional funds for med school, the internal rate of return for doing a residency in OMFS is about 25% when compared to an average general dentist.

Again, setting aside everyone imagining about their amazing business prowess (We are talking about pre-dents and dental students, the majority of whom have no clue about business aside from the Hollywood Video they were assistant manager at during high school), ON AVERAGE, the OMFS will do significantly better financially over their lifetime.

http://jada.highwire.org/cgi/content/abstract/132/12/1679

Good footnote but do you believe that all docs report their actual income to an ADA survey? I wouldn't, and don't. It's none of their business. And lots of OMFS docs do not belong to the ADA, so where are they getting their info from?

 

[Tommy43087]

Bill Dorfman is a cosmetic GP in LA and makes close to 9 digits.

That's because of all the exposure he got! he's been featured on many shows.

He is an outliar


http://www.billdorfmandds.com/



But still even 9 digits sounds like too much...

 

[jay47]

Bill Dorfman is a cosmetic GP in LA and makes close to 9 digits.

Didn't he also found Discus Dental? (http://www.discusdental.com/; he pops up on the screen, lol) and several other companies? I think that has a lot more to with how much he makes than his procedures. Two hands can only do so much work, GOOD WORK, in a certain amount of time.

 

[Tommy43087]

Does GP mean he didn't do a residency? Just DDS or DMD?

LOL

GP...General Practitioner

has nothing to do with residency, well as far as being a "GP"

 

[armorshell]

Good footnote but do you believe that all docs report their actual income to an ADA survey? I wouldn't, and don't. It's none of their business. And lots of OMFS docs do not belong to the ADA, so where are they getting their info from?

I don't believe all docs report their income on the ADA surveys, but I do believe that the response rates for OMFS members and GP members are pretty similar, and I also like to imagine the non-responder groups have similar salary dynamics, meaning that while the salary numbers probably aren't accurate, the IRR is likely pretty close.

 

[NileBDS]

Didn't he also found Discus Dental? (http://www.discusdental.com/; he pops up on the screen, lol) and several other companies? I think that has a lot more to with how much he makes than his procedures. Two hands can only do so much work, GOOD WORK, in a certain amount of time.

Absolutely! Think about it ... lots of very rich sloppy dentists out there. Just the other day a patient was astonished that she could floss again between her two front teeth again after I repalced some of her old class 3 fillings. Why? She had a compisite bridge of class 3 fillings, which probably took her previous dentist all but 10 minutes to do ... 4 anterior composites in 10 minutes. You do the math.

http://www.discusdental.com/about/dr-bill-americas-dentist.php#

I've personally been to his lectures and had the chance to talk to him in person, and as you'd imagine, an incredibly charismatic and intelligent guy.

However, powerpoint slide after power point slide made me cringe. It's the typical business man mentality (with a healthy dash of used car salesman attitude). Throughout his presentation you hear stories like "this patient was terribly traumatized by her smile, and has had to live with this disability her whole life! Sally had ugly, discolored and crooked teeth, but unfortunate for her, she couldn't afford braces. We accepted Sally and were able to give her a life back. We helped her out with a complete smile makeover! 20 veneers and a zoom bleach later, Sally has a clean bill on life!".

Really ... ? Couldn't afford braces, but somehow magically pulled $30,000 out of her ***** for 20 DaVinci veneers? No time to treat underlying Perio? You get the picture.

But aside from that, yes, the money is made from his companies, endorsements, investment, media exposure from TV makeover shows and such (I believe he actually did that show for free, just for the exposure and marketing he got from ABC, not sure). Not dentistry. Dentistry will afford you a more that comfortable lifestyle, but how you decide to grow and nurture your wealth is up to you. Your hands can only produce so much. That is unless, of course, you have 12 hands (hint...associates)!

http://www.billdorfmandds.com/meet-the-team/dr-dorfman/

 

[NileBDS]

Actually, including the 4-6 years of falling behind, and the outlay of additional funds for med school, the internal rate of return for doing a residency in OMFS is about 25% when compared to an average general dentist.

Again, setting aside everyone imagining about their amazing business prowess (We are talking about pre-dents and dental students, the majority of whom have no clue about business aside from the Hollywood Video they were assistant manager at during high school), ON AVERAGE, the OMFS will do significantly better financially over their lifetime.

http://jada.highwire.org/cgi/content/abstract/132/12/1679

I agree.

That is an interesting study (but yeah, a lot has happened for dentistry in the past 10 years). Rotary endo, invisalign, Periolase, Implants, weekend mini-OMFS residencies for GP's.

Based on the study's results however, it seems that the main financial advantage (ROI) for OMFS would be retiring a couple of years early (one year for ortho) with the current average income of a GP owner being in the high $200k's. No?

I am certain that an OMFS would make a ton more than just [FONT=arial,verdana,helvetica,sans-serif] $587,563 .over their career life time than a GP.

On the same note, everyone saying that OMFS routinely do 4 wizzies under sedation in 30 minutes and make a million dollars ... well, for one, maybe. Not all cases will take 30 minutes. I've observed OMFS in private practice and in my limited experience it will sometimes take that long just to induce some patients. And two, have you seen an OMFS schedule? It's not like they're booked 8 hours solid for wisdom teeth with sedation. On a good day, they would probably have 3 or 4 cases like that, but the rest of the day may be a single extractions, post-ops, implant consultation, oral pathology consult ....

Has anyone thought that maybe OMFS, ortho, endo perhaps do better because ON AVERAGE also they tend to be smarter than the AVERAGE GP, and in turn are more likely to make better financial decisions, investments, career choices than most GP's? I guess what I'm saying is if you took any one of the said specialty residents out of residency, and put him/her in a private practice setting, I could argue that they would probably do just as well (if not better) as they would have in specialty practice. It's the decisions you make everyday that create a favorable environment for you to succeed. No one person is entitled to no certain amount of money just because they did one particular thing.

 

[setdoc7]

I agree.

That is an interesting study (but yeah, a lot has happened for dentistry in the past 10 years). Rotary endo, invisalign, Periolase, Implants, weekend mini-OMFS residencies for GP's.

Based on the study's results however, it seems that the main financial advantage (ROI) for OMFS would be retiring a couple of years early (one year for ortho) with the current average income of a GP owner being in the high $200k's. No?

I am certain that an OMFS would make a ton more than just [FONT=arial,verdana,helvetica,sans-serif] $587,563 .over their career life time than a GP.

On the same note, everyone saying that OMFS routinely do 4 wizzies under sedation in 30 minutes and make a million dollars ... well, for one, maybe. Not all cases will take 30 minutes. I've observed OMFS in private practice and in my limited experience it will sometimes take that long just to induce some patients. And two, have you seen an OMFS schedule? It's not like they're booked 8 hours solid for wisdom teeth with sedation. On a good day, they would probably have 3 or 4 cases like that, but the rest of the day may be a single extractions, post-ops, implant consultation, oral pathology consult ....

Has anyone thought that maybe OMFS, ortho, endo perhaps do better because ON AVERAGE also they tend to be smarter than the AVERAGE GP, and in turn are more likely to make better financial decisions, investments, career choices than most GP's? I guess what I'm saying is if you took any one of the said specialty residents out of residency, and put him/her in a private practice setting, I could argue that they would probably do just as well (if not better) as they would have in specialty practice. It's the decisions you make everyday that create a favorable environment for you to succeed. No one person is entitled to no certain amount of money just because they did one particular thing.

I take real offense to this allegation that somehow the specialists you mentioned are in some way smarter than GP's. As I have stated before, I know plenty of OMFS, endos, and even orthos who are pulling down peanuts. Business accumen is not measured on the national boards or d school transcripts. I still put forward that any doc can pull down big numbers, but it is a function of their willingness to learn how to run a business well and take a few risks along the way. I have found over the years that specialists who do not do as well as others tend to be grouped into the pool of those who do not get good referrals from their GP counterparts. Perhaps it is because they like to bash them.

 

[armorshell]

Has anyone thought that maybe OMFS, ortho, endo perhaps do better because ON AVERAGE also they tend to be smarter than the AVERAGE GP, and in turn are more likely to make better financial decisions, investments, career choices than most GP's? I guess what I'm saying is if you took any one of the said specialty residents out of residency, and put him/her in a private practice setting, I could argue that they would probably do just as well (if not better) as they would have in specialty practice. It's the decisions you make everyday that create a favorable environment for you to succeed. No one person is entitled to no certain amount of money just because they did one particular thing.

I dunno, I'd almost say that book knowledge and financial sense seem inversely related, at least in my case.

 

[charlestweed]

On the same note, everyone saying that OMFS routinely do 4 wizzies under sedation in 30 minutes and make a million dollars ... well, for one, maybe. Not all cases will take 30 minutes. I've observed OMFS in private practice and in my limited experience it will sometimes take that long just to induce some patients. And two, have you seen an OMFS schedule? It's not like they're booked 8 hours solid for wisdom teeth with sedation. On a good day, they would probably have 3 or 4 cases like that, but the rest of the day may be a single extractions, post-ops, implant consultation, oral pathology consult ....

Most wisdom teeth cases take less than 30 min for an OS who works at the office that I also work at. He also has his own private practice and he also tries to book as many wisdom cases in a day as possible. His assistants are very well trained. They handle all the pre-op and post-op procedures for him. When he walks in, the IV already started….he administers the med, extracts teeth, and moves to the next room. For a GP practice, this would take more than an hour to prepare for just 1 wisdom teeth extraction case because of the lack of experienced staff.

Has anyone thought that maybe OMFS, ortho, endo perhaps do better because ON AVERAGE also they tend to be smarter than the AVERAGE GP, and in turn are more likely to make better financial decisions, investments, career choices than most GP's? I guess what I'm saying is if you took any one of the said specialty residents out of residency, and put him/her in a private practice setting, I could argue that they would probably do just as well (if not better) as they would have in specialty practice. It's the decisions you make everyday that create a favorable environment for you to succeed. No one person is entitled to no certain amount of money just because they did one particular thing.

I am neither book smart nor business smart. I got accepted to ortho because I went to a P/F school. The reason I do better than a lot of my GP colleagues is because I picked ortho.

Specialists make more in a day because most of their procedures are high paying procedures ($2500 for 4 wisdom teeth, $2000 for an implant, $1200 for molar endo etc.) and they can do them in a short amount of time. Even for a simplest $50 class I amalgam filling, it still takes the GP 10-15 minutes to do it.

 

[DrReo]

Most wisdom teeth cases take less than 30 min for an OS who works at the office that I also work at. He also has his own private practice and he also tries to book as many wisdom cases in a day as possible. His assistants are very well trained. They handle all the pre-op and post-op procedures for him. When he walks in, the IV already started….he administers the med, extracts teeth, and moves to the next room. For a GP practice, this would take more than an hour to prepare for just 1 wisdom teeth extraction case because of the lack of experienced staff.


I am neither book smart nor business smart. I got accepted to ortho because I went to a P/F school. The reason I do better than a lot of my GP colleagues is because I picked ortho.

Specialists make more in a day because most of their procedures are high paying procedures ($2500 for 4 wisdom teeth, $2000 for an implant, $1200 for molar endo etc.) and they can do them in a short amount of time. Even for a simplest $50 class I amalgam filling, it still takes the GP 10-15 minutes to do it.

I read somewhere on DT, I believe, where a GP purchased a retiring oral surgeon's office and continued to do implants and extractions with his staff. I'm not sure how that worked out.... Would this be pheasible?

 

[KlingonDentist]

As a GP we can do all things a specialist can do. But are we productive or fast in doing all things? Are a a master at all things?
Being a GP can be rewarding because you can do a variety of procedures and less boring than a specialist but can also be stressful because we try to do all things when we're not fast at it.

 

[charlestweed]

I read somewhere on DT, I believe, where a GP purchased a retiring oral surgeon's office and continued to do implants and extractions with his staff. I'm not sure how that worked out.... Would this be pheasible?

This GP probably tries to convert this OMFS facility into a regular GP practice. The GPs in the area won’t refer the patients to his office when they know he’s not an OMFS. The reason we, specialists, advertise our practice as “practice limited to……” is to let GPs know that we are not their competitors….so please refer patients to us🙂.

 

[setdoc7]

Most wisdom teeth cases take less than 30 min for an OS who works at the office that I also work at. He also has his own private practice and he also tries to book as many wisdom cases in a day as possible. His assistants are very well trained. They handle all the pre-op and post-op procedures for him. When he walks in, the IV already started….he administers the med, extracts teeth, and moves to the next room. For a GP practice, this would take more than an hour to prepare for just 1 wisdom teeth extraction case because of the lack of experienced staff.


I am neither book smart nor business smart. I got accepted to ortho because I went to a P/F school. The reason I do better than a lot of my GP colleagues is because I picked ortho.

Specialists make more in a day because most of their procedures are high paying procedures ($2500 for 4 wisdom teeth, $2000 for an implant, $1200 for molar endo etc.) and they can do them in a short amount of time. Even for a simplest $50 class I amalgam filling, it still takes the GP 10-15 minutes to do it.

Again, know plenty of OMFS and endos not pulling down these fees. It sounds good when you expound on this board to d students and pre dents, but I KNOW that not every specialist is getting FFS.

 

[charlestweed]

Again, know plenty of OMFS and endos not pulling down these fees. It sounds good when you expound on this board to d students and pre dents, but I KNOW that not every specialist is getting FFS.

What I am trying to say is the specialist can effectively do more high paying procedures in one day. For example, the ortho can tx 50-80 patients/day, the OS can do 5-6 wisdom teeth cases/day, the periodontists can place 3-4 implants/day etc. Therefore, the specialists' daily income tends to be higher. The problem is many specialists don't have enough patients to stay busy 5 days/week like the GPs. I know a lot of specialists who are struggling to find jobs…many of them only work 1-2 days/week. I work 5 days/week but I have to travel to 6 different offices. My wife (a periodontist) travels to 7 different offices and she only works 13-15 days/month.....and when she is there, she places, on the average, 2-3 implants.

 

[somethinpositiv]

You're wrong.

anything over $200k(single) or $250K (married) means you're getting reamed by Obama's plan to tax you to death. It is not worth working hard in this country anymore. The govt is incentivizing laziness with welfare and discouraging hard work. What backward thinking!

I'm wrong when I said "in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream"? Now you're just getting greedy!

Did you even look into the details the healthcare bill? If you make over $200K you will get taxed an extra 0.9%. If you made exactly $200K, you would pay an extra $1,800. Yeah, it sucks to lose money, but it's not the end of the world, you're not going to starve to death making only $198K... Losing $2K isn't going to make me more lazy or discourage me from working hard... where did you get that from??

How Star Trek of you to be catastrophizing the health care bill...

 

[DrReo]

I'm wrong when I said "in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream"? Now you're just getting greedy!

Did you even look into the details the healthcare bill? If you make over $200K you will get taxed an extra 0.9%. If you made exactly $200K, you would pay an extra $1,800. Yeah, it sucks to lose money, but it's not the end of the world, you're not going to starve to death making only $198K... Losing $2K isn't going to make me more lazy or discourage me from working hard... where did you get that from??

How Star Trek of you to be catastrophizing the health care bill...

But WHY should you loose that .9% because you do work harder?

 

[NOsaintsfan]

I'm wrong when I said "in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream"? Now you're just getting greedy!

Did you even look into the details the healthcare bill? If you make over $200K you will get taxed an extra 0.9%. If you made exactly $200K, you would pay an extra $1,800. Yeah, it sucks to lose money, but it's not the end of the world, you're not going to starve to death making only $198K... Losing $2K isn't going to make me more lazy or discourage me from working hard... where did you get that from??

How Star Trek of you to be catastrophizing the health care bill...

I don't want to get your all worked up but if you've never made that kind of money (over 200K) and never had the tax burden that goes with it, then you really don't know what your talking about. I respect your right to an opinion however its not like 200K just falls out of the sky, you work hard for that money and after taxes you get alot less than 200K.

To make it simple lets do some easy math. The top marginal tax rate now is 38% (it will go up to 42% next year) so of the 200k you made you get to keep 124K.

Now you may be perfectly fine living off of that ammount, however you MIGHT feel a little different if you are actually in that situation. I could be wrong. Also remember that the math I used is not really that simple, there are all sorts of other taxes that you will pay in reality to make your income even lower than the ammount I stated. Its just to give you an idea.

Also what about the livelyhood that your provide for people? Thats right most dentists employ other people (assistants, hygenists, ect.) These people depend on you for their income ie. to feed their children. So not only do you make a living for yourself, you essentially provide a living for other people as well.

Keeping all this in mind is why many people reject the idea of taxing the "rich" more because they can "afford it".

Just some food for thought.

 

[setdoc7]

What I am trying to say is the specialist can effectively do more high paying procedures in one day. For example, the ortho can tx 50-80 patients/day, the OS can do 5-6 wisdom teeth cases/day, the periodontists can place 3-4 implants/day etc. Therefore, the specialists’ daily income tends to be higher. The problem is many specialists don’t have enough patients to stay busy 5 days/week like the GPs. I know a lot of specialists who are struggling to find jobs…many of them only work 1-2 days/week. I work 5 days/week but I have to travel to 6 different offices. My wife (a periodontist) travels to 7 different offices and she only works 13-15 days/month.....and when she is there, she places, on the average, 2-3 implants.

What I am saying is I know plenty OMFS, perio, and endo specialists pulling down PPO fees, which are far less than you are fronting in your post. Not every specialist is living the dream, and lots of GP's are pulling in plenty. So in essence, the average income for any dentist is strictly what the individual strives to make. Intelligent business people will always do well.
Also, I would not give to much credence to any studies listing the average income of dentists. No one I know would answer these questionnaires.

 

[KlingonDentist]

I'm wrong when I said "in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream"? Now you're just getting greedy!

Did you even look into the details the healthcare bill? If you make over $200K you will get taxed an extra 0.9%. If you made exactly $200K, you would pay an extra $1,800. Yeah, it sucks to lose money, but it's not the end of the world, you're not going to starve to death making only $198K... Losing $2K isn't going to make me more lazy or discourage me from working hard... where did you get that from??

How Star Trek of you to be catastrophizing the health care bill...

First I apologize if I insulted anybody.

I used to be an idealist like you until I started working for my own money (age 27).

The healthcare bill is peanuts (0.9%). Start looking at the regular tax code and AMT and you're looking at over 50% tax (fed,state, city ie, total taxes) for the higher income tax brackets. This hits the upper middle class (those $200k to $500k) extremely hard. I call this zone the twilight zone because there is not incentive to work harder since the amount you work more then $200k gets all taxed away(well most), so might as well not work harder and stay below $200k.

When I was a student I was ecstatic even felt like it was heaven like, you mentioned, just to think about getting $70k /yr, I thought this profession is unbelievably great!
But when I started working and my life is stressed to the bone physically and mentally, you'll think differently. This is your blood and sweat and you work hard for it. Especially there is so much unbelievable waste in gov these days..would you rather keep more of your hard earned cash and utilize it in better ways?

 

[KlingonDentist]

I'm wrong when I said "in my opinion anything over $200K and you're living the dream"? Now you're just getting greedy!

..

I don't think I am being unreasonable or greedy for wanting to keep more of my own hard earned money.

I'm not being unscrupulous, unethical nor unprofessional nor resorting to robbery nor sleaziness to get the money... but just to keep what I worked so hard at achieving...how greedy is that?