Yes, a lot.
Right after graduation, I was hired by a corp office to replace a 70+ yo orthodontist, who had to miss work serveral times due to his poor health. According to the asssistants, he had multiple eye surgeries. A lot of times he had to let the assistants position the brackets for him....a job that is supposed to be performed by the doctor. The company was afraid of getting sued so they hired me to replace him.
In 2009, I purchased an office from a 60 yo orthodontist. In her office, there was actually a built in twin size bed, which I later tore it down and converted the room into an additional tx room, for her to take a nap. She saw about 8-10 patients per day from 8am-5pm. When I took over, I booked 4-5 times more patients per day and reduced the work days from 16 days/month down to just 6 days/month....and once I got used to the system, I cut down further to only 4 days/month. To be fair, she only had 1 chairside assistant, whom I later fired because she's too slow. I brought in 3 P/T assistants, whose combined salaries are less than what she paid her F/T assistant. I remember when I looked at that practice, a lot of orthos came by (it was an open house day) but no one made an offer because the office was 30+ years old. The seller was actually a 2nd owner of that practice. The office was very low tech (the receptionist still used a typewriter), which I like. And it was in 2009 when the country was still in the recession. I bought it for a very low price.
My wife's former boss had carpel tunnel . He had to hire associate periodontists to work for him so he could claim the disability money from his insurance. He later sold the practice to my wife's co-resident.
I don't know what will happen to me in 5, 10, 15 years from now. Human life is so fragile. I've seen many young dentists, who are only in their 40s, 50s and had to stop working because of carpel turnnel, cancers, and death. This is why I continue to work as hard as I can when I am still able to do so. My kids are still very young.
