Apparently so. It also appears they do NOT care thousands of children are abused and have their mouths mangled by said Dental Serivice Organization. It seems to me, the children have been sold to the DSO’s. Interesting, being that it comes from the Black Causus, right? Just saying!
From Dentistry IQ:
“As part of its policy priorities for 2017, the National Black Caucus of State Legislators (NBCSL) has resolved to support the nation’s leading dental support organizations (DSOs) in their mission to provide affordable, quality dental services to underserved populations across the United States. The policy resolution, “HHS-17-17: A Resolution to Stand in Support of Dental Support Organizations,” was ratified during the NBCSL’s Annual Legislative Conference, held Dec. 2-5, 2016.”
Dr.
Michael W. Davis maintains a general dental practice in Santa Fe, NM.
He serves as chairperson for Santa Fe District Dental Society
Peer-Review. Dr. Davis also provides a fair amount of dental expert
legal work for attorneys. He may be contacted via email: MWDavisDDS@comcast.net
Corporate Dental Branding- What Dental Consumers Need to Know
A brand is a
name, term or symbol which one company uses to differentiate its products and
services, from that of another company.1 Corporations employ numbers
of different strategies in branding. Healthcare professionals are generally
fairly ignorant on corporate branding practices, as this is not an element of
their formal education. By contrast, those parties which beneficially own
corporate dental practices retain individuals well-skilled and well educated in
all forms of retail sales, marketing, and finance. Their abilities include a
plethora of differing and complex branding methodology.
In its
simplest form, a chain of corporate dental clinics may seek direct brand
recognition by consumers. They may market “outstanding dental care at
reasonable prices”, all associated with their brand. Branding may be part of a
marketing program to generate public goodwill via broad mechanisms, ranging
from well-publicized charitable events to sponsoring a NASCAR driver.2 Branding
may also be associated with the business model of dental Medicaid care.
Unfortunately
for the corporate dental industry, many of their more established brands have
become associated with abuses to the public welfare.3-9
(Author’s
note: References only cite a mere handful of well reported abuses generated
from corporate dentistry, disclosed by government officials.)
Dental clinics
managed and directed by non-doctor corporate management often have a troubling
record, which the public is witnessing. Likewise, dentists who may be employed
in such workplaces are also witnessing abuses to the public interest generated
and facilitated by brand-name companies in corporate dentistry. As such, many
in the public are avoiding dental services offered by branded corporate dental
practices. Further, these branded corporate practices are finding
employee/doctor attraction and retention increasingly challenging. One
corporate chain recently reported over 10% loss in total dentist staff for a
one-year period.10
Crowd Sourced Branding-
Numbers of
branded corporate dental groups are increasingly discovering their branded
identity has negative consequences. In fact, the term “corporate dentistry” is
an example of “crowd sourced branding”, in which the public assigns a company a
brand (positive or negative), versus the traditional method of branding, in
which a company designs their branding scheme.
Some dental
corporations have fought back by explicitly marketing their distance from
“corporate dentistry”. One such ad from a corporate dental chain openly states,
“You Hate Corporate Dentistry and So Do We”. The veracity of their claim seems
highly suspect, especially when one views their multiple settlement agreements
with multiple states’ attorney generals. However, corporate dental management
is evidently far more concerned with negative fallout of crowd sourced branding,
versus presenting truth in the public marketplace.
To further
counter the negative public impression of corporate dentistry generated by
crowd sourced branding, numbers of corporate dental chains market the
misrepresentation of doctors, and not faceless Wall Street types, as owning
dental practices. The reality is very different and highly disturbing.
Numbers of
dental chain corporations establish specific individual doctors to act fully as
sham-owners, who have no control of management, the sale of “their” asset of
the dental practice, or control of clinic bank accounts. In fact, these
shame-owner dentists have no idea how the funds generated by “their” dental
clinics are allocated; depositions in the Small Smiles mass action lawsuit made that abundantly clear.
Other
corporate dental chains establish a group of dentists acting as sham-owners,
via the accounting mechanism of a professional corporation (PC). Again, these
doctors have no true and valid ownership privileges of dental practices, as
beneficial ownership passes to non-doctor corporations, often private equity
investment firms. Some of the world’s largest and most well-known private
equity firms currently are or formerly have been the beneficial holders of
corporate dental chains, which direct patient dental care.Examples
include Morgan Stanley11, Valour Investments Ltd.12,
Carlyle Group13, American Capital Strategies13, FFL
Partners14, Gryphon Investors15, MSD Capital (holdings of
Michael Dell family)16,17, etc.
There is so much more to this story so expect an indepth look VERY soon.
Just for a sneal peek, let’s just say it involves a couple of Harvard grads (Brian Walker and Jonathan Jardine), some Brigham Young University grads, a very proud Harvard professor and a bunch of dentists whom I would say are ethically challenged; a former Kool Smiles dentist, Dr. Diaa Zora and another “owner” dentist, Dr. Ketan Sukkawala, being just two of the many.
BROKEN ARROW - A Broken Arrow mother reached out to 2 Works for You after a popular Broken Arrow dental practice presented her with an estimate for more than $5,000 to fix her toddler's baby teeth.
Sarah Powell said she felt like she had failed her three-year-old son, Jaxon, when a dental practice told her he had 13 cavities in his temporary baby teeth.
"I was mortified," Powell said, "I couldn't fathom how he could have that many issues and no pain."
Powell said the dental assistant at Super Smiles Dental Office in Broken Arrow rattled off a list of work Jaxon needed and numbers Powell needed to call, then stopped and said, "Oh, you have private insurance. This is going to be expensive," according to Powell.
Because Powell said she had been regularly brushing Jaxon's teeth since they popped up, and that she took him for regular check-ups since he was 18 months old, she sensed something had to be wrong.
Despit Super Smiles logo, it doesn’t seem to be exactly a “Fun Place For Teeth”, does it?
Wish I could report EVAN D CLOTHIER DDS, was some sort of corporate dentistry thug, but I can’t. I guess he’s just a thug. His Oklahoma dental license is current and there are no reported sanction listed. But that doesn’t mean much since so often they are never reported by the dental board.
On Wednesday of this week (November 16, 2016) at 1:30 there is to be a public hearing held by Texas Health and Human Services (THHSC) in the Brown-Heady Building, 4900 North Lamar Blvd, Austin, TX. The purpose of the public hearing is to receive comments related to a 10.45% reduction in reimbursement to Ambulatory Surgical Centers for Dental Rehabilitation and Restoration. My sourse says this reduction is spear headed by the Dental Service Organizations (DSO') whose target patients are children on Medicaid and is to take effect January 1, 2017.
(Why aren’t these “hearing” held at a time when the actual public or interested parties are available? It shall be interesting to see who is there to offer “public comments”. THHSC website indicatged the hearing will be webcast and available to watch here: http://legacy-hhsc.hhsc.state.tx.us/news/webcasting.asp.)
The source states the long term plan is to reduce the number of licensed pediatric dentists and oral surgeons from accepting children who currently require sedation for treatment, whereby those dentists will drop out of the program thereby limiting the access to quality care for the children. This is outrageous!
I’m told the DSO's plan to hire young new graduates carrying loads of student debt general dentists to perform these procedures, The source hinted a system is already in place to make sure all children meet the qualifications to require sedation.
As it was told to me, it is planned to be much like the orthodontic scam that took place in Texas just a couple of years ago whereby nearly all children suddenly qualified for braces and the per-authorization process was to rubber stamp and approve every child!
(Let’s not forget how dentists were trained on how to scam the system by Dr. James (Jim) Orr and attorney Robert (Bob) Anderton, in Anderton’s private office. Orr, at the time was Dental Director of the claims agent for Texas. In sworn testimony before the State Office of Administrative Hearings (SOAH) witnesses stated Orr and Anderton taught them how to “utilize” the HDL scoring system in place to qualify children for orthodontic braces. In addition the processors, who worked from home, were paid $50 for each approved application! For more on there click here.)
No doubt the Ambulatory Surgical Center’s are not going to complain too much about a reimbursement rate reduction when they expect their patient volume to skyrocket. Win, Win for everyone, right? Well except the children who are needlessly sedated for what is likley to be unnecessary dental procedures, like 4 year old Navaeh Hall who was left brain damaged or Daisy Lynn Torres or 3 year old Marvelena Rady who both died this year.
For the public who would like to make comments by mail:
Health and Human Services Commission Attention: Rate Analysis, Mail Code H-400 P.O. Box 149030 Austin, TX 78714-9030
Overnight mail, special delivery mail, or hand delivery: Health and Human Services Commission Attention: Rate Analysis, Mail Code H-400 Brown-Heatly Building 4900 North Lamar Blvd. Austin, TX 78751 Phone number for package delivery: 512-730-7401 Fax: Attention: Rate Analysis at 512-730-7475
