About Dental Care Ireland

Established in October 2014 by brothers Colm and Kieran Davitt, Dental Care Ireland offers a new approach to the provision of dental care in Ireland. According to Mr Colm Davitt, CEO Dental Care Ireland, the company’s strategy is to acquire and invest in local dental practices and develop them in partnership with the incumbent dentist.

As the former CEO of Euromedic Ireland which specialised in radiology, Colm has years of experience of building up successful group practices in this way.  “This time last year I started looking at the dental sector and given my experience in building Euromedic I felt there was probably an opportunity in the dental sector to do something similar in terms of the creation of a high quality group of dental practices,” he stated.

“The market is very fragmented in Ireland most of the dental market is comprised of single handed practitioners …so I felt that there was an opportunity to create a group which would take the best traditions of your local dental practitioner and work to support them in terms of a more contemporary approach. To take some of the hassle away from the dentists,”Colm added.

According to Colm one of the key trends he has witnessed in dentistry in Ireland in recent years is a reluctance on the part of younger dentists to own their own practices as it can come with all the potential headaches associated with running your own business such as HR, administration etc. This is where Dental Care Ireland can help. By taking over the running of the business from an administration point of view the dentist is free to concentrate on what they do best – taking care of patients.

Our strategy is to acquire and invest in existing, strong, local dental practices and help to develop them into the future, Colm explained. “We can provide a good supportive organisational structure to work with those dentists, which can work quite well for us and the dental practitioners. There will be increasing requirements in terms of compliance on dentists in the years ahead and many of the dentists will have to invest in their practices, so we feel that the timing is good in terms of creating a group of dental practices,” he added.

To date Dental Care Ireland have acquired a number of dental practices, including Dr John McHugh’s practice in Castlebar Co Mayo, Dr Maura McGuinness’s in Kells in Co Meath, The Park Clinic Dental in Cabinteely and Knocklyon and Dr Kieran Ryan and Dr Chris Scott’s practice in Tullamore. The company is also on track to successfully complete negotiations with more in the coming months.

To date Dental Care Ireland has received extremely positive feedback from dentists with many valuing the many benefits the company can provide to their practices. “We always like the practitioners to stay on with us for anything from a year to five years. The practitioners we are talking to are very supportive because it enables them to realise some value for their lifetime’s work. They can remain practicing as a dentist for a period of time, in many cases easing themselves into retirement. Also they can see that the practice may need an investment or a fresh approach and they are happy to work with us to continue the development of their practice into the long term,” he explained.

Coupled with taking over the hassles associated with running your own business, Dental care Ireland also invests in the practice in areas such as new equipment etc. as well as providing professional marketing and public relations. It will also look after the raft of compliance issues which are coming down the track as a result of promised new dental legislation to replace the 1985 Dental Act.

“We will run the practices on a day to day basis so the practitioner can focus on seeing patients, Colm stated.

There are also numerous benefits to be gained by patients as Dental Care Ireland will offer competitive prices, longer opening hours and a modern high quality patient centred service. “Patients will get a more consistent more standardised approach. We will invest in terms of the facilities, equipment and standards ensuring that they are always at top level”, Colm added.

Dr Kieran Davitt is Group Clinical Advisor to Dental Care Ireland and as a working dentist with a busy practice in Galway; Kieran is all too aware that dentistry in Ireland is changing in more ways than one.

While traditionally dentists have been single handed practitioners working out of their own homes or from a small office off a busy street, Kieran believes that much like what has happened with GPs, more and more dentists will come together to work from larger purpose built practices or primary care centres.

Like Colm, Kieran believes that Dental Care Ireland can play an important role in supporting dentists with the business side of their practices for which they received little if any training.

“When we go to College we get training on clinical issues we are not really trained on running a business, or management or dealing with HR. Longer established dentists haven’t really have to deal with it because there wasn’t that much legislation, but with the new Dental Act that is coming in there are more and more regulations all the time.  I find in my own practice I spend much more time now away from the dental chair than I would have five or ten years ago,” he explained.

“If you ask any dentist what they are most comfortable with, they will probably tell you that seeing their patients, treating their patients and doing their dentistry is probably what they are happiest doing. What gives them real headaches and stress would be the extra stuff on the side like the administration and all the other things that they are probably not used to, or trained to do,” Kieran added.

Dental Care Ireland therefore can come in and take over the headache of administration leaving dentists to their clinical work and their patients. Kieran believes that this is something that would be very appealing to a number of his colleagues.

“Our idea is to run modern, well-equipped practices that are well marketed. We would like to improve or grow existing dental practices and we would like dentists to be part of it,” he concluded.