Totally Oral Podcast

Russell met Brandon Allison at Sprintray Next 2024 in Miami.  Brandon is practices in Mandeville, La with his wife and brother (both dentists) in a family office.  He and his wife took over from his father and has turned it into a bustling office to say the least.  Brandon bought both the Sprintray 2 and Midas printer but also has a VHF E5 mill and does a lot of his own digital designs.  We talk about his CE journey and about he strives to learn how to do excellent clinical dentistry while maintaining a good business.  

Deren Flesher goes Totally Oral with Clinton Timmerman and Russell Schafer.  He has a private practice in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and has found a niche giving advice to dentists in various ways they can invest.  Check out his podcast Wealth Beyond the White Coat  and his website for Legacy Point Group to find out what pearls and advice he can offer you. 

Harry Wheeler and Alistair Stoddart, two dental students from The University of Glasgow in Scotland, United Kingdom, had a chance to shadow Clint at Blu Dental & Wellness in Marysville, Washington, for a week.  Before they flew out, Clint had a chance to sit down and hear their story.  Listen, and find out how dental school and the dental world is on the other side of the pond. 

This week Russell talks with Jesse Flore, CDT out of Las Vegas.  Jesse runs a specialty business supporting dentists who want to get involved in the digital world.  Jesse got his start as a denture technician which obviously made Russell kinda geek out.  Jesse is also an authorized Exocad distributor and helps implement mills and printers into dental offices.  We talk for an hour about how the new MIDAS printer will likely go into dental offices as well as how milling and printing and designing should be implemented in offices.  If you are looking to expand your dental office into a lab, call up Jesse Flor.  He will be an excellent resource. 

So Russell went to Sprintray's event and his SD card was corrupt and lost a great podcast with Vu Le...  Vu graciously came back on to talk with him for an hour about the cool new happenings in the world of 3d printing.  We discuss 3d printing, glidewell, and the MIDAS printer.  Finally we talk about his invention the VPR which is a great tool that every single dentist needs to take excellent photographs with their cell phone.  If you want to find out more about the VPR, go to Photodontist and buy one.  We don't get any money from it, but Russell owns a VPR 400 and uses it regularly.  They are great.

This week Russ and Clint speak with Patrick Allen who is a denturist from Maine who teaches dentures to lab techs, denturists, and dentists.  Patrick and Russ geek on dentures because of course they do.  We talk about lower suction dentures and how they work. Patrick is doing an upcoming course in Maine in June that Russ would highly recommend if you want to learn about dentures.  It is June 14th and 15th and is phenomenal.  Registation has been extended by a bit if you want to sign up. https://trellis.org/bps-semcd-w-paul-mcnally-peter-anastasia Also we talk about how the Maine Dental Board does everything public apparently.  If you want to listen in, you can hear it here. https://mainestate.zoom.us/j/83015731890?pwd=QmhVTjRPNDZtLy9aRXZCS2VBOEJydz09   Meeting ID: 830 1573 1890 Passcode: 56815338

Ericka Aguilar, The Dental Billing Coach, joins Clinton Timmerman and Russell Schaffer to share the secrets of getting claims paid when they are initially denied.  It turns out there's not much to it; it just takes knowing how to Google search for the state dental insurance commissioner and send a message to the right resource (and don't give up if it you're reffered to a federal agency!).  Ericka also tells us her tricks to the trade for billing procesures we are most likely already doing but not including in our claims and ways she can negotiate insurance fees.  You can find Ericka on Instagram or, better yet, go to HiddenDentalProfit.com and find out how she can help your office.  Also, give her a listen at The Dental Billing Podcast.

A Lab Day 2024 Clint and Russ were invited to the Evolve party in Chicago where they met Jonny Jackson.  Jonny is one of the CDTs at Evolve Dentistry which is a dental supply company and lab out of Buffalo, NY that offers a full range of products and services for dentists.  Russ and Jonny talk about where Exocad is going as well as the importance of good training.  Finally we discuss the camaraderie that is found in dentistry and how honestly refreshing that is.  If you want to follow Jonny Jackson on IG, he can be found at @jonnyexocad for all of his latest and coolest stuffs or go to Evolution Dental Lab to learn more about everything that they offer.

Clinton and Russell talk with Rand Luka, a dentist originally from Iraq who immigrated to Canada in 1999.  Listen to his origin story of going through the steps to becoming a dentist in Iraq to the training he received in Canada in order to practice in Ontario.  He also has some key advice for administering patient care. 

This week Russell talk to Dr. Nelson Mar who practices in Phoenix.  Nelson went to University of Nebraska for dental school and then did a GPR in Oklahoma.  We talk about his journey from San Francisco through the Midwest to the Southwest as well as about running a practice and dealing with crazy patients.

Russell and Clint speak with Erik Zundo of West Lafayette, Indiana, a Fee For Service dentist who has found success in the Hoosier State.  They discuss insurance fees and reimbursement, the Overton Window and ADA meetings and associated fees.  The beginning of the conversation got cut off, but it was mainly Clinton discussing vexillology in the Southern Hemisphere, so no loss, really. 

Russell Schafer and Clinton Timmerman are joined by Mandy Arena, a Denturist in the Midwest leading the charge to make denturists legal in every state.  Surprisingly, only a handful of states have legalized denturists.   Their next step is to put legalizing denturist on the ballot in Illinois.  Citizens of Illinois, get out and vote for a worthy cause and help legalized denturists.  Except for Russell, no dentist really wants to do dentures, so let denturists take them off of their hands. 

So Clint and Russ didn't do as much podcasting as expected in Chicago but they had a lot of fun.  We talk about our experiences at both meetings and how we would fix Midwinter.  We talk about the technology that we saw at both meetings and our impressions.  The episode had to be editted down from 50 mintues to 44 minutes because Russell went on a 7 minute rant on how angry he was that resin was wasted.  

So we went to Chicago with the intention of doing a lot of interviews but we didn't really do much.  However, we did sit down for a late night/early morning interview with Matthew Standridge.  We discussed many topics from the American Equilibration Society  to patient expectations to running an office in this day in age.  Finally if you want to take a course from Matt (which I highly recommend), go to his website, go to 3d dentists, or go to The American Orthodontic Society.   

This week Russ goes solo with a friend Dr. Brian Schweer.  Brian talks about how he has implemented technology in his office as well as how he has managed to determine what CE makes the most sense.  Finally we talk about his part time job and cash flow of a new dental office. If you want to hear his latest podcast with Alan Mead, listen to Dr. Brian Schweers Contains Multitudes over at The Very Dental Podcast.   It is another great listen.

Frank Clayton joined Russ and Clint and was able to tell us the definitive answers to the big questoins we have had our entire lives.  Answers to questions like: -What is the meaning of life? (42) -How to make enough money in the stock market to retire in just one week -Who really shot JFK? -Who really shot JR? -Where did Amelia Earhart land? (Hint: Not where she intended to) And so much more.  However, we had some technical difficulty and the episode will be lost forever.  If you want to know what Frank said, call his office directly during business hours and ask to speak to him, even if he is in a procedure.  We did, however, manage to have a chat about the latest top ten rankings of dental schools and what makes a good dental school. 

Clint and Russ bring back Sandy Pardue to talk about her upcoming classes and pick her brain about managing dental offices.  Sandy talks about her two seminars Front Desk Pro where she covers scheduling and her new course called Office Management Pro where she covers how to run an office.  We talk about a variety of business topics from scheduling to collecting money to training employees.   If you want to learn more about Sandy's upcoming courses and her consulting company, it is called Classic Practice Resources.  She also does a regular podcast called Dental Drill Bits as well.  Finally her Facebook group is Dental Gumbo.

This week Clint and Russ interview Dr. Viraj Gadkar.  Viraj is a second generation dentist in New York City who with his wife has owned and operated a multitude of offices.  Viraj wanted to come on to discuss his opinion about PPO and medicaid offices and how he feels that they are misunderstood and that everyone overhypes FFS.  We talk for an hour about his journey from running a few medicaid offices, his foray into DHMO, his purchase of a high end FFS office, and how he bought a whale of an office that has some interesting connections to New York City...  

This week Clint and Russell interview Dr. Heather Gentry from North Carolina.  Heather runs a FFS office that focuses on holistic dentistry.  Heather practices practical holistic dentistry as a way to differentiate her office from others in her competitve market of Charlotte, North Carolina.  She is quick to point out that she still does regular dentistry with regular dental materials, but that she offers extra services to help her market for new patients like using ozone and biocompatablity testing for patients with allergies.  We also talk about how becoming a holistic dentist allow Heather to become a FFS dentist and drop all of the PPOs but also the challenges of being a FFS doctor compared to a PPO doctor.  If you want to learn more about holistic dentistry, go to IAOMT.org and IAMBD.org for more information as that is the organization we reference.

This week Russell talks with Dr. Graham Dersley out of Maryland.  Graham went to Colombia Dental School for undergrad and then did his Prosth speciality at Maryland.  We talk about Graham's journey from associate to buying an existing office to two scractch starts.  Graham has a love of full arch fixed implants and talks about how he incorporates certain new tech into his office but not everything.  We also talk about how his offices have made the switch from a more hygiene model to a problem focused model in marketing especially in a landscape where hygienists are harder to hire.