Families Concerned About Small Smiles
Posted: March 17, 2009 03:40 PM
Updated: March 17, 2009 09:30 PM
Jason and Naomi Pinkston called FactFinder Investigators shortly after taking their four-year-old daughter, Aerial, to the dentist. They say they knew right away something wasn't right.
"I feel they took advantage of my daughter to make a profit," says Naomi.
Jason says the family did research shortly after their experience at the clinic.
"All you have to do is Google these guys to get page after page of horror stories. It felt like a nightmare we couldn't wake up from," says Jason.
That nightmare, as Jason describes it, is the work Small Smiles performed on Aerial. The family showed us before and after pictures of Aerial's teeth. Her baby teeth were showing signs of decay so Small Smiles ground them down and put crowns on them. But the Pinkstons say their problems began before any work was performed.
"She didn't explain anything to me about why it would be important to Aerial to have crowns-whether we didn't do it what would happen or what a crown was. Absolutely nothing," says Naomi.
We don't know if the work was necessary; it's too late to get a second opinion because her teeth are gone. We can tell you four of Aerials front teeth that were crowned by Small Smiles will have to be pulled by another dentist.
We wanted to talk to Small Smiles about Aerial's dental work, but instead were referred to a company in Washington, D.C. Spokesperson Don Meyer tells us the clinic thinks Aerial's treatment plan was appropriate, but the execution was less than ideal. He says because of what happened, dentists in the Wichita clinic will seek continuing education.
"What we're finding is that some of our dentists may require some extra training on what's called a ‘New Smile Crown'," says Meyer.
Although Small Smiles markets exclusively to children, we were told none of the dentists at the clinic have pediatric qualifications. They are trained only in general dentistry.
We talked to pediatric dentists in the Wichita area. All of them told us many of their patients come from Small Smiles. Patients like Shelbi Meisch's daughter Amaya.
"She's terrified to see the dentist, still. Every time we go she's scared to go in," says Shelbi.
Like the Pinkstons, Shelbi doesn't feel her options were explained and Small Smiles ended up pulling six of Amaya's teeth.
"No they didn't tell me they were going to be pulling all those teeth. I was under the impression they were going to crown two back teeth and pull the front teeth," says Amaya.
Another dentist had to perform corrective work Amaya's case.
Then there is Stacy Luthy and daughter Emma. Stacy contacted us after learning we were working on the story.
"They informed me that they had a harness they put the kids in that restrains them. They made it sound routine and no big deal."
Stacy wasn't allowed to be in the room with her daughter when they went to Small Smiles about two years ago.
"About 20 or 30 minutes later they came out and said she had been throwing up. They brought her to me. She had been screaming. She was horrified. She was in tears," says Stacy.
Like Aerial and Amaya, Emma has also had corrective work performed. The teeth Small Smiles crowned fell out, leaving her with nothing until her permanent teeth come in.
The parents say all three girls now have to be sedated to even visit the dentist.
"She'll never not be afraid of a dentist, which is alone is horrible because it's such an important thing to do," says Naomi Pinkston.
That's why the Pinkstons came to us. To encourage other parents to ask the questions they didn't ask.
More Company Response:
Forba, the company that manages Small Smiles, tells us many changes were made in late 2007. They include some of the following:
- Parents are now allowed back with their children during visits. Small Smiles made the change after receiving complaints from parents.
- It conducted about 12,000 surveys seeking parental feedback.
- Working to better communicate with parents.
- Dentists have been retrained on the use of protective restraint
- Created a toll-free number for parents to call with concerns or complaints (1-877-302-KIDS)
- Kansas law requires dentists' offices to be locally owned. This is the company's response to corporate ownership concerns.
It is not uncommon for doctors and dentists to hire or outsource various professional and specialized services, including advertising, computer technical support, legal advice, and even human resource specialists to assist them in managing their practices. For example, the Kansas Medical Society created a practice management firm to provide a broad range of office management services to physician practices around the state. Such services are provided under a management services agreement, include a variety of services and are done for a negotiated fee, much like our agreement with Dr. Reza.
Click here for the transcript of the live chat that took place after the segment aired.
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This blogger's Comments:
I don't care what kind of crap they say, Dr. Mohammad Reza Akbar doesn't own this clinic. At the Kansas Secretary of State's Office it says the mailing address is:
Linda Zoller
618 Church Street, Suit 520
Nashville, TN 37219
(FORBA Holding and FORBA Services Address, Linda Zoller is just the VP of the legal department and does most of the state business filings.
I don't even think Dr. Reza Akbar lives in Kansas but I could be wrong, he didn't used to.
As you noticed no one at FORBA would speak on camera, heck they don't speak off camera. They only send their PR guy, Don Meyer to appear, or write responses or start a blog to defend and promote the company. You would think Dr. Reza would want to defend his own clinic wouldn't you?
Don Meyer says a lot of changes took place in 2007. Well, evidently not near enough since I didn't start this until early 2008 and I've heard these horror stories for well over a year now, and they still keep coming in. All of their talk is nothing but Hogwash and they think people are actually going to be gullible to believe it.
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Here is just one comment from the KWCH TV Website: (go to the bottom of the page and click on 'see all comments')
I know I can't stop it all but anything helps. Yes I will be out of a job but there will be a lot of kids that won't be put through this there. As for the dentist in Colorado....yes it is a different state but Small Smiles is nationwide and all of the training is done in Pueblo, CO for the dentists so you see...they have one way of training and we have had a number of dentists that were just as bad, maybe not taking drugs but doing terrible work or pulling permanent teeth when it should have been the baby tooth, or numbing the right side and then working on the left side and ignoring the child's screams of pain.
I know they have the same sub standard type of dentists across the nation. Maybe not ALL of them but a good portion of them are very substandard. The good dentists that we have had didn't last long. They left because they refused to work like that and didn't want to jeopardize their licenses. Trust me...when I first started working there I couldn't believe this type of care was actually going on in America. Maybe I will loose this battle and they will continue to operate but at least I tried and I know I have saved a few kids from the horror and pain along with the parents.
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UPDATE:
By Michael Schwanke (WICHITA, Kan)
investigators@kwch.com
316-831-6166
Update:
STATEMENT FROM SMALL SMILES DENTAL CLINIC OF WICHITA
Every year we see thousands of children who receive compassionate, high-quality dental care at our dental center. Through our parent surveys, comment line and direct interaction with caregivers, Wichita families regularly express high levels of satisfaction with our care.
However, based on the story aired by Channel 12, an internal review of standards, quality and compliance has been initiated at the Small Smiles Dental Clinic of Wichita.
We take seriously any parent who expresses concern with their child's care, and we are always looking for ways to improve. We strongly urge any parent who has concerns to contact our parent hotline at 1-877-302-KIDS.
Kansas Dental Board is asking that anyone with a complaint regarding Small Smiles contact their office.
You can file an offical complaint at http://www.kansas.gov/kdb/ or call 785-296-6400.
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This blogger's comment:
1. The key word in that statement is the word "our". If Dr. Akbar owned that clinic wouldn't the term be "my" but no, they once again FORBA admits to owning these clinics.
2. I've heard this same statement over and over for 2 years! Why do you think that hotline number was set up in the first place?
3. The Kansas Dental Board has been alerted on several occasions about Small Smiles and their tactics and haven't done a darn thing so far. But I highly suggest you give it a go anyway.
4. I like to hear from those patients who were actually treated by Dr. Mohommad Reza Akbar himself.
2 Must Read Comments:
Where's the accountability for the parents letting their child's mouth begin to rot at 2-4 years old?
I work at a dental Office that is considered to be corporate denistry in Little Rock, Arkansas. My office manager has asked several of the employees for pain medication. I worry that if i go to the corporate office about this issue that I will lose my job.
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