by Raising the Level of Care
I am often questioned by dental support organizations and dental industry partners about our readership in this publication. Some are asking from an advertiser’s perspective, while others are just plain curious as to who may have an interest in reading what group practices and DSOs are up to. We have a unique mix of readers here at Efficiency in Group Practice. Large dental support organizations make up a chunk of our readership, as you may expect, but we also have hundreds of smaller [4-10 office] dental group practices enjoying the publications as well. Dental industry partners, solo practitioners, and private equity firms round out the rest of our subscribers.
Let’s focus on the smaller dental group practices, or as I’d like to refer to them, emerging DSOs or emerging dental groups. Emerging DSOs seem to be the focal point of everyone in the dental industry as well as those beyond its borders, like private equity. There are various reasons for the interest.
Dental industry partners are seeking access to these emerging groups as they look to sell products and services and grow their business as these groups grow. Access can be easier; the sales cycle may be faster and the relationship can be less transactional than with larger DSOs. The largest DSOs are also very interested in connecting with these emerging groups. Obvious reasons include simply paying attention to what your competition is doing, looking for potential acquisition / affiliation partners and monitoring industry-wide as well as geographic specific dental group trends.
Targeting these emerging dental groups and DSOs, the Association of Dental Support Organizations is holding its first ever Partnering for Growth event in National Harbor, Md., at the end of September. Beyond the obvious reasons already stated, the ADSO is also conducting this event to help educate emerging groups on everything from setting up the correct legal structure as your group scales up, to putting together a compliance program that will protect growing DSOs and their patients. While this meeting is not the first meeting geared towards emerging groups this is certainly the first meeting of its kind where the largest DSOs in the industry will help mentor these emerging groups. The philosophy behind this strategy is that sharing best practices and proven strategies which have worked for larger DSOs will help improve emerging groups chances of success, the patient experience, and will raise the level of care for the entire DSO movement. We will have a full recap of the Partnering for Growth event in the next issue of Efficiency.
In this issue of Efficiency in Group Practice, as always, there is must read content. This time of year we focus on new technology and equipment which feature specific advantages for dental groups and DSOs. Get insight from DSOs such as Benevis as their CIO talks about their process of evaluating new technologies for their dental support organization.
Enjoy this equipment and technology issue,
Bill Neumann
