Find Aspen Dental Near Me – Teresa Ferrito, 87, who survives on $1,300 a month, worried about the cost when her dentist told her she needed two teeth pulled.
She thought an oral surgeon would be too expensive. So she decided to try a dental chain that promoted steep discounts in advertising. She went to an Aspen dental office outside of Cleveland.
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Ferrito said Aspen Dental not only pulled the teeth but also insisted on a complete exam. She was stunned when they finally handed her a four-page treatment plan. Total cost: $7,835.
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Ferrito couldn’t afford it, but Aspen Dental signed her up for a special credit card with monthly payments of $186 for five years. She blames herself for signing the papers.
After a day of cleaning and two fillings, Ferrito asked his son for help. Called Aspen Dental to complain but got nowhere. So they turned to the state attorney general.
Aspen Dental has removed all charges from her credit card for treatments not yet received. But the company said the $2,540 she charged for two fillings and a cleaning was reasonable.
Aspen Dental charged Ferrito $350 for an antibiotic the dentist placed near the teeth the dentist was about to pull, which other dentists say is pointless. An antibacterial rinse like Listerine for $129 had four separate charges. There was even a $149 charge for an electric toothbrush that Ferrito didn’t even know she had until she recently retrieved an Aspen dental bag from her garage and found it inside.
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Asked if Ferrito was taken advantage of, Aspen Dental Chief Executive Robert Fontana said, “I hope the team was clear about what she wanted and that she fully understood what she was doing. And, you know, she made the choices that she thought were right for her. “
Aspen Dental is a network of approximately 350 offices in 22 states managed by a company owned by a private-equity firm. It’s part of a fast-growing industry of corporate dental practices, many of which specialize in serving people who can’t afford to go to the dentist, and a group of dentists are neglected.
By marketing to people who haven’t seen a dentist in years, Aspen Dental often provides new patients with treatment plans that cost thousands of dollars. The Center for Public Integrity (CPI) and Frontline investigated Aspen Dental for months and found complaints that the same business model that Aspen Dental provides to people with no money puts people into debt and overcharges or overcharges patients. treatments.
Former employees say Aspen Dental trained them in high-pressure sales. Corporate management scrutinizes the productivity of dentists and employees on a daily basis. Internal documents show dentists receive bonuses as they meet key production goals.
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“You’ve got people in management who aren’t dentists … they’re breathing down the doctor’s back,” said Jenny Hayes, who last year worked as an office manager for Aspen Dental in the Chicago area. “There are goals, and if you don’t reach the goals, you lose your job.”
Aspen Dental denies that its dentists have stronger financial incentives than other dentists or that its bonuses affect treatments. Fontana, founder and chief executive officer of East Syracuse, N.Y.-based Aspen Dental, said dentists don’t perform unnecessary treatments because “it’s not in their DNA.”
“I’m not sure what corporate dentistry is because we don’t have influence in dentistry,” Fontana said.
He said Aspen Dental frees up dentists to focus solely on patients because the company handles back office duties such as marketing, accounting and billing. In fact, dentists own and control all practices, Fontana says. All but four states prohibit anyone who is not a dentist from practicing under the assumption that dentists are trained and motivated to put patients before profit.
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But Sen. Charles Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, questions whether dentists at corporate dental chains are immune to corporate pressures to maximize profits. Grassley, the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, would not speak specifically about Aspen Dental, but he has had committee investigators probing the company and other private-equity-owned chains for months.
“Because when private equity firms get involved,” Grassley explained, “you have to understand that their motivation is to make money. They’re not dentists. Dentists should be deciding what’s best for teeth, not some private equity manager on Wall Street.
Aspen Dental says it serves people who don’t go to the dentist. According to a survey conducted by WK, 40 percent of Americans have a family member who puts off going to the dentist. Kellogg Foundation. Fontana says Aspen Dental is looking for ways to make it easier for those people to walk to their offices.
Their offices are easy to find in shopping centers, often near fast food restaurants. Posters advertise free exams and x-rays. Many of their new patients walk in the door without an appointment. Aspen Dental accepts most insurances and if the patient is still short on cash, they will sign you up on day one for “no interest” credit cards through GE Capital or Chase.
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Aspen Dental specializes in custom made dentures in each office. The consultation room has a tray of dentures to choose from, from the basic no-frills model to the “precision hand-crafted” Comfilites, which come in 27 shades. Internet ads offer dentures on sale for $249. Its advertisement tells the stories of a man suffering from bad teeth and a woman who is too shy to smile.
Aspen Dental requires all new patients to have a thorough exam. Whether someone wants a regular cleaning or just needs a broken tooth fixed, Aspen Dental offers a treatment plan for any problems that may arise years later. Fontana says this approach is best for patients because neglected teeth and gums can lead to serious problems. However, many former employees describe the initial exam as a sales ploy to increase revenue for each new patient.
“People would come into the office with a toothache and come out with a treatment plan, and the dentist might have said you have to pull all your teeth out,” said Jenny Hayes, a former office manager in Illinois. “They were put in the manager’s office and sat through an intense consultative sales process and couldn’t bargain when they walked in the door. People were literally breaking down and crying in my office. And it happened regularly. “
According to an internal company document obtained by CPI and Frontline, the average treatment plan presented to new patients runs $4,450 at Aspen Dental’s top-producing offices. The company says the advanced treatment is a reflection of the patients they draw.
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“The typical patient is between the ages of 45 and 65 and is struggling to make ends meet,” said Aspen’s CEO Fontana. “They’re taking this week’s paycheck to pay off last month’s mortgage, making their car payment, trying to get the kids to school, and unfortunately, dental care can become discretionary.”
Donna Kelsey of Des Moines, Iowa fits the profile. At age 55, she hadn’t been to a dentist in 15 years. She didn’t have dental insurance and didn’t think she could afford it. Also, her teeth had never bothered her until she had a gap between her two front teeth. Embarrassed, she finally left after seeing an ad for an Aspen dental office.
Kelce was x-rayed and sent to a consultation room, where a dental assistant handed her a treatment plan. Kells’s gaze rested on a particular word.
“Oh my God, I could feel the blood running down my face. Teeth,” Kells said.
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Kells recalls that the dentist told him he had no real choice but to extract the teeth because the implants had lost so much bone. She wasn’t sure how she could afford Aspen Dental’s $3,700 bill. But then the office manager signed her up for a “no-interest” credit card through Chase. Relieved, Kelsey thought she was getting a bargain.
She returned in late November 2009 to have 13 teeth extracted. But the dentist pulled and pulled and couldn’t get all the teeth out, and one broke at the root. Kelsey wondered if so much bone was gone and why the teeth weren’t coming out easily. Three hours later, the dentist still had six teeth to pull, but said she couldn’t do more because she had already given Kells the maximum amount of Novocaine.
Aspen Dental referred Kells to one of her previous dentists who could see her that evening. Dr. Jessica Lawson looked at Kells’ teeth and concluded that there was no need to pull them all out. But she got the job done so Kells could wear her dentures. She suggested that Kelsey report the incident to the Iowa Dental Board. Lawson himself wrote to the board.
“Having worked at Aspen Dental for a short period of time, I am very familiar with the kind of care that is available, especially at any time.
