Aspen Dental
| Industry | Dentistry |
|---|---|
| Founded | Syracuse, New York, New York, U.S. (1964) |
| Area served | United States |
| Services | Dental Care services Dentures |
| Website | [1] |
Aspen Dental is a company offering "complete dental care solutions," providing general and cosmetic dentistry and denture care for families and seniors. The company has been accused of unethical business and sales practices and a business model that emphasizes profit over patient care.
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[edit] History
Aspen Dental’s history started in Syracuse, New York, at a dental lab called Upstate Dental, which began operations in 1964. In 1981, Upstate Dental merged its lab services with centralized management services to initiate the new dental practice management concept. The company became Upstate Dental Management, LLC in 1997 when an investor acquired Upstate Family Denture Services, Inc., Upstate Denture Labs, Inc. and East Coast Dental Management, Inc. The last step in the creation of Aspen Dental came in 1998 when Upstate Dental and East Coast Dental merged and agreed on a common name: Aspen Dental Management, Inc.[1]
[edit] Today
Aspen Dental serves approximately 1.5 million dental patients at more than 250 office locations in 21 states: Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin.
Each office has certified oral hygienists, dentists and oral surgeons for general dental care. Additional offerings include: emergency and major cosmetic dental care, crowns, bridges and oral surgery. They also have a line of proprietary dentures called Comfidents. Aspen Dental accepts most dental insurance plans, and has a variety of payment options and low-cost services[2][3][4][5]
Aspen Dental Jobs is a professional career resource offering dentists, dental specialists, hygienists, lab technicians and support staff to search dental professional openings online within Aspen Dental’s network of 250 office locations in 21 states across the U.S.[6]
[edit] Aspen Outreach
Aspen Dental has programs in place to provide low- or no-cost dental care to financially burdened patients: reduced fees for dental services and discounts to unemployed United Auto Workers members.
In 2009, Aspen Dental launched an initiative with Oral Health America to battle oral cancer. Activities for this partnership consisted of oral health education and an oral cancer prevention program for the Little League Baseball World Series[7][8][9][10]
[edit] Security Incident
Aspen Dental notified customer by postal mail that between October 3rd and October 6th, the payment section of their website was not SSL protected.
The problem was originally brought to Aspen Dental's attention on Otober 5th by a Twitter[11] post and a phone call to a regional manager.
Aspen Dental maintains that the lapse in security was resolved within 60 minutes, but the publicly available twitter posts show that is not the case.
Aspen Dental has employed Kroll Fraud Solutions to handle identity theft related to this incident. The letter sent out by Aspen Dental had both company's name at the top of it. Kroll has also been made aware of the possibly inaccurate statements regarding how long it took to resolve the issue.
[edit] Criticism
Aspen Dental's business model has drawn considerable scrutiny from both consumers as well as dental professionals in private practice. Many consumer review websites on the internet are filled with complaints which often revolve around the practices Aspen Dental uses to up-sell their customers on expensive and often unnecessary procedures and dental treatments.
The practice of developing treatment plans for their patients and offering to arrange financing in house leads many patients to experience sticker shock when an itemized bill of suggested treatment plans can total several thousand dollars. The company regularly receives low rankings on consumer review sites such as Yelp, Google Local, and Insider Pages. In addition, further frustration grows from consumers who feel the company uses scare tactics and pushy sales methods to sell more services and extra items such as electric toothbrushes exceeding $150.00 USD.
The corporate business model of the company conflicts with many dentist's personal views, ethics and draws debate as to their obligations under Hippocratic Oath. Many dental professionals feel the heavy-selling, profit-first business model conflicts with looking out for a the patient's best interests. Their business model results in a high turnover rate, leading to many of their technicians, dentists and hygienists being inexperienced and freshly out of school with student loans. Their position with Aspen Dental puts pressure on them to sell as many dental-related services as possible in order to maximize profits. Many former and current employees have attested on various internet websites as to their personal experience with the company, mostly revolving around a theme that offices are typically run inefficiently and profit is placed before a patient's best interest.
The company appears to hire representatives to monitor online review and consumer websites for negative publicity and reply from a standardized list of responses as a means of damage control and maintaining a positive public relations images.
[edit] References
- ^ Aspen Dental Timeline, http://aspendentalnews.com/index.php/about/timeline
- ^ Aspen Dental Office Locations, http://www.aspendent.com/offices.locations.html
- ^ RDH Magazine Article "Aspen Dental plans continued expansion in 2009", http://www.rdhmag.com/display_article/349998/54/none/none/IndNw/Aspen-Dental-plans-continued-expansion-in-2009
- ^ New office opening announcement, Newark Advocate, http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/newarkadvocate/access/1850649891.html?FMT=ABS&date=Aug+29,+2009
- ^ Aspen Dental Office Locations, http://www.aspendent.com/services.offerings.html
- ^ Aspen Dental Jobs http://www.aspendentaljobs.com
- ^ CBS Affiliate WTOL News Story, “Don't ditch the dentist – free clinics are here”, http://www.wtol.com/Global/story.asp?S=11021298
- ^ Barnstable Patriot Article, Aspen Dental Offers Access to low-cost and free care, http://www.barnstablepatriot.com/home2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=18641&Itemid=111
- ^ Erie Times News, “Dentist leaves patient grinning”, http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=ET&p_theme=et&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=12055D8741CDDE48&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM
- ^ Marketwatch Article, “Slogan Contest Educates Young Baseball and Softball Players About the Dangers of Tobacco Use”, http://www.marketwatch.com/story/slogan-contest-educates-young-baseball-and-softball-players-about-the-dangers-of-tobacco-use-2009-08-26
- ^ Twitter Post, https://twitter.com/#!/AspenDental/status/122001697177481216
[edit] External links
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