I smell a troll, maybe...if not, well, here goes. Work less and make more, wouldn't that be the dream
1) If you're not a fan of hygiene checks, guess what 50% of ortho is about - checks!
2) Same for pedo - the only ortho cases I refer out are phase one.
3) With advancement of clear aligners, GPs are doing more and more ortho (see #2), which means you are stuck with more difficult cases and with less and less referrals. So, you'd have to wine/dine more GPs to get your piece of the pie. Now imagine you piss off a patient as a GP - you'd lose that patient and maybe 2-3 more of their family/friends. If you piss off a patient from a referral source, you are risking ALL of the patients from that referral source.
4) Becoming a specialist now would mean selling your practice (or getting a full-time associate) while you are in school for 2 years. This means a massive loss of revenue. I wouldn't put an associate for 2 years, as it would devaluate your practice, which you'd most likely have to sell upon graduation, anyway.
If you own your practice and have been there for more than 3 years, 250-300K is kinda low. Perhaps you need to optimize your practice instead to get you to the 400K? Have you incorporated ortho into your practice? Have you though about bringing in an associate to decrease your work load?
Have you read this report put out by the AAO? The job market for ortho is not great
im going into it because it is less stressful than being a Gp, and yes I can make more money. Everyone wants more money- maybe ego, I don’t know that is too general a question
Not so sure. The flow of an ortho practice is completely different than a GP office. The set ups are just not the same to make it very profitable in a GP office. Plus I enjoy the ego of being called a specialist
Do you regret going back to do Endo? What were the challenges first year after residency? I always see Endo position ads on Indeed - for $400-450k a year! Is that typical? I’m sure you need to be fast and experienced to make that level of income. How many cases did you average a day your first year or so after residency?
out 7 years. I think most could get in now if they wanted to with the expensive programs. It shows how much dentists want to do ortho since they can charge so much and still have applicant. Ortho is beautiful life compared to being a GP, no more stress and anxiety
Actually, any field in dentistry is a beautiful life if you “love” doing it. The problem is, majority of people I met don’t truly love dentistry and were drawn to it financially.
That’s why I think speed matters a lot, like a GP. If I was Endo new grad today, I would be slow and maybe doing 2-3 cases a day for the first year or 2. Even with 40-50% - I would not be netting the $400k+ a year numbers for a while. Just like a GP would not net $250-300k a year for a while, maybe 2-3 years for a motivated GP.
The fees range from city to city, state to state, like GPs. The northeast has the highest Endo fees, an average of about $1,600 for a molar case.
That’s the office fee for an Endodontist, not the insurances fee schedules. Insurances would pay less.
If your taking on the addition schooling for ortho you should come out making more than a GP. No one does ortho in dental school to know it’s their passion. Most if not all ortho applicants expect to make more than GPs
True. But anyone who does ortho should do it for the “passion”, and not for “making it”. General dentists have 100x potential in terms of income - but most general dentists are not business savvy and don’t bother understanding their full potential.
