All I can say is that I was lured into signing a contract in December of 2006 with Sears Dental which goes by the name of DentalCare Partners and DentalWorks.
I was blinded by the beauty of a brand new office they opened. Let me tell you that they are a Dental Mill. As a new dentist you are required to see all walk-ins, emergencies plus your scheduled patients with one assistant to your disposal. The corporate manager assigned to my facility barely looked beyond the front desk and would rarely send another girl back to clean up after the main assistant if we were running behind. They staff the doctors with new assistants just out of school that are virtually untrained. Good luck keeping up with a schedule with lack of assistance! You are expected to see all walk-ins, so it's not a surprise when you are running behing schedule that your "scheduled" patient still sitting in the waiting room waiting walks out MAD! Corporate expects you to do just about everything whether you are qualified in full mouth surgeries or not... Oh sure, they'll say... don't do a surgery if you're uncomfortable, but if you refer too many complex case patients to outside specialists you will lose your job! The hours of operation are terrible. I would arrive at 9:20 in the morning to go through charts and give a huddle before 10:00 AM and the office was open until 8:00PM at night. Almost all days were without a lunch or break. My one assistant was more overworked than me and so I also cleaned rooms and instruments of which I did not get paid to do. I had a hygienist only one day a week and so I was required to do just about all of the perio unless it was advanced.
They have a $49.00 special for an exam, full mouth series and adult prophy. Patients would come in with mounds of calculus demanding that you clean their teeth right then and there. Some patients would comply when you informed them that they need scaling and root planing by the hygienist. Others would scream and yell and make my life miserable because they came for their $49.00 special.
I worked for this Corporation all for a beginning percentage of 26% of collection and it goes upward from there depending upon your production. (maximum 32%)
This past week I requested a few days off at the end of march and the beginning of April on my children's spring break. In addition, I took an authoritative stand with the corporate office manager assigned to my facility to get the office running better. However, I am a female dentist and she did not like that one bit. I was out of the office on thursday and friday and on friday I received a 6 line letter stating that I WAS TERMINATED IN MY POSITION WITHOUT CAUSE. Maybe it's my ego speaking, but I happen to be a damn good dentist who only took this job because I was looking at opening my own practice and the expense involved and someone contacted me from their corporation for this position.
Think twice before considering a job with Sears... If dentistry is your only life and can be in the office 10 plus hours a day, then maybe it will work for you. You have to be fairly good in all oral surgery cases also which just isn't my thing... I like cosmetic and restorative dentistry.
My advice is Beware and Be Cautious before signing a contract with this corporation!!!
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