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Filling Gaps in Business

Sometimes Dr. Sue Wendling will be excavating a tooth, drill whining like a horde of angry mosquitoes, when her patient abruptly starts twitching, then explodes with laughter. Not because of nitrous oxide, but because the scene playing behind the patient’s virtual reality glasses, on a miniature movie screen that helps put the drill out of mind.

Comedy is the biggest genre in Wendlings 100-title video library — most requested, Chis Farley’s Tommy Boy — which is one of the many amenities at her 1000 patient dentistry practice.

Since 1997, the practice has been in at Oswego Point office with an expansive view of the Willamette River. Her web site promises boat-gazing from the operatory, a Brookstone massage chair, heated neck pillows and blankets, lavender scented towels, paraffin hand dips, digital before and after smile portraits and door to-door town car service.

“I get a lot of my ideas from day spas,” says Wendling, a West Linn resident, who teaches comedic dentistry at the Las Vegas institute for Advanced for Dental Studies. “I’m a dental-phobic myself, so I’m always looking for things I can use. It’s also how I promote my practice,” she says. “Most of my patients come to me by referral. They go back to work and say, ‘You’re not going to believe this,’ and talk about the experience of having a warm pillow put at the base of their neck…We’ve created a culture.”

It’s an elite culture that’s being replicated across the nation. The June issue of Dental Practice Report, a trade journal that focuses on the business side of dentistry, carried a six-page cover story, “Dental Spas: Fad, Niche, or Emerging Trend?”

According to the article, the practice of luring patients in with an elaborate array of creature comforts has blossomed in the last six months. It’s being driven largely by cosmetic dentists attempting to build practices in a down economy and to differentiate themselves from the competition – not only other dentists, but also do-it-yourself kits for teeth whitening, one of the most common cosmetic procedures.

Meanwhile, the Madison, Wisconsin based American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry offered a discussion on “Spa Dentistry” at its annual conference last spring.

According to Eric Nelson, a spokesman for the academy, its membership has expanded in recent years as more general practice dentists are offering cosmetic procedures. Many are trying to supplement a death in revenues from once-common maladies like cavities, which have become increasingly rare and needed to be refilled less often because filling have become more durable. Although a fraction of the academy’s 5,500 members have incorporated spa-like amenities into their practices, Nelson says the trend is catching on, especially as the recession lingers.

“The days of drill-and-fill dentistry are over,” says Nelson. “Our dentists aren’t just competing with each other, they’re competing with all the electives things people do in their lives. Right now people are stuck between, ‘Do I want a new car, a trip to Paris or a smile make-over?’ A full mouth of veneers can cost between $3,600 and $20,000.”

Nelson’s not kidding. Wendling charges $1,200 a tooth for veneers. For a full mouth whitening, she charges $460 to $900, and for a full mouth restoration, the bill is between $36,000 to $40,000.

At the Art of Smile Making in Lake Oswego, a cosmetic dentistry practice owned by academy member Steve Lind, the chair – which at the flick of a switch offers a full body massage – is rarely empty. Lind supplements his services with virtual reality goggles, surround sound headphones and heated towels and blankets. He orders doughnuts for his morning patients and pours wine for his afternoon patients.

And at Paramount Dental Care in West Linn, which opened in Cascade Summit in October, Grant Smith offers freshly baked bread and cookies. Gardenia-scented aromatherapy candles burn in the waiting room, which, with its overstuffed chairs and couches, looks more like’s someone’s living room.

More candles burn in the operatories, where the lights are dim and patients listen to James Taylor on Bose headphones or watch “Happy Gilmore” or “Forrest Gump” on ceiling-mounted flat panel displays. Even the sound of the drill is missing because Smith has switched to an air abrasion tool that works like a miniature sand-blaster, eliminating the whine and need for Novocain. All is quiet except for the occasional guffaw.

“Without a doubt, this is increasing our client base,” says Smith, a Lake Oswego resident who’s already invested $50,000 in his new office and is planning to add a full time masseuse.

“To have a patient laugh during a root canal is a really neat experience.”

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