Hello. This is Arianna Porta Latin with the
Becker's Dental and DSO Review podcast. I'm thrilled
to be joined today by doctor Siberia Brannen,
a practice owner at Affordable Dentures and Implants.
Doctor Brannen, thank you so much for being
here today.
I'm glad to be here. Thank you for
the invitation.
Definitely.
To start us off, can you introduce yourself
and tell us a little bit about your
background?
Yes. My name is Sabirat t Brannen.
I've been practicing dentistry now for a little
bit over 31 years.
I have great joy in practicing.
I graduated from the University of Detroit,
in 93
and then I did a post grad program
at the University of Michigan AGD program.
Afterwards, I opened a practice from scratch
in,
a small town outside Detroit called Ferndale, Michigan.
And then I practiced there for about 10
years. I did a lot of CEREC training
across the country.
And then I wound up here in Arizona
which I've been practicing here since 2,006. At
first I was when I first arrived here
I was doing some training with CEREC and
CADCAM with Pacific Dental
Services. And after 3 years at Pacific Dental
Services I
became a practice owner here with Affordable Dentures
and Implants since 2009.
I currently own 3 practices under the network,
one in Sun City,
one in Avondale,
Arizona and also Bullhead City,
Arizona. Bullhead City, for those who don't know,
is right there on the border of Laughlin,
Nevada. So I'm in
the the northwest
corner of Arizona. So I have a lot
of ground to cover.
And,
I also had a chance last year opening
my first,
implant fellowship program.
I graduated 1,
associate
resident
and he's now my managing dentist at the
Bullhead City practice.
And and also in my free time, I
like to do volunteer work in Latin America.
I do a lot lot of dental work
or dental,
volunteer dental work in Nicaragua.
And so I've been doing that since 2014.
So
I think that's a good good bit of
information about myself.
Definitely. Thank you so much for that. First
question here, what are some of the biggest
issues that you're following right now in the
dental industry?
Men
implantology
and, mentorship, and particularly in the areas of
implantology.
I've gotten a lot of,
training from different,
great leaders in implantology
from doctor,
Mangalo
to doctor Hoglock
to,
to many other doctors that I can attribute
my training to. And implantology
is not given enough training time in dental
school. And in order to go out and
and adequately place implants, you need to have,
the training number 1 outside of dental school,
but most importantly, you need the clinical mentorship
in this particular area.
Okay. Great.
And I'm also curious. What are you most
excited about when it comes to dentistry right
now, and what makes you nervous?
Excited. Technology. I've been working with tech technology
since, my post grad program with the 1st
generation CEREC.
So I've always been,
intrigued by technology.
I think one of my the the story
I need to stay away from is Best
Buy because that's just the house of technology.
But outside of that, I just love technology,
how it can be used in, in dentistry
and particularly in the area of full arch
tooth replacement therapy.
That that has come so far as far
as digitally planning your implants to digitally making
provisional
and from that point even digitally making your
final prosthetic. It's
very, very exciting how we can do so
many things
dentistry today with technology and, of course, single
tooth replacement, single tooth crowns and stuff like
that. We've been doing that for,
again, since 'ninety three at the very least.
So,
I'm very excited about that. All the new
avenues I'm pretty much on top of, at
least I try to be.
What makes me nervous is, again, you know,
the technology is coming out, but do we
have enough training programs
to handle all the different complications and understand
these different workflows?
And, I'm really nervous in the area of
full arch therapy because
sometimes,
you know, that is
a large treatment that that you need to
have a good handle on all phases of
of specialty as far as perio to prod
and to
implantology as well. So a lot of times
a 2 day or 3 day weekend course
is not enough to,
make you want to go back on Monday
to do full arch therapy on a patient.
So it's a definite evolution of talents and
skill sets
that will allow you to do our surgery
correctly. And that was that that was what
makes me nervous. Sometimes you make it seem
so easy, but at the same time, we
have to have a handle on so many
different,
skill sets.
Okay. Yeah. Have you found it difficult to
add new technology to your practice with all
those challenges in mind?
No. Right now,
fortunately, I'm I'm kinda niche into tooth replacement
therapy, so it's pretty easy from my point
for making dentures from digital dentures to,
placing virtually placing implants and doing the planning
prior to creating surgical guides, it's pretty seamless
in my particular niche of dentistry, so in
tooth replacement, it's it's pretty straightforward.
And it's pretty straightforward,
just doing
regular general dentistry for the most part, but
in my particular field, it's
it's it's straightforward.
Alright.
Next question here. What will the most effective
health care leaders need to be successful in
the next 2 to 3 years?
I I think finding their patient niche. I
mean, before again, I've been doing general dentistry
for at least half my career.
And actually, once I became the practice owner
at Affordable Dentures Amp Plan and found my
niche, I felt like I was able to
help more people
in this particular niche because a lot of
times we have a lot patients that already
had a tooth extracted,
they need a replacement
or they have a,
and they need to know which route they
can go. A lot of times with
extractions, it's because of the economics of the
patients
that would, that let them down this particular
road. So,
I think that's gonna be the biggest challenge
coming up. Understand the patient care,
and their
limitations
financially, finding out how we can get dental
assurances to increase their coverage, annual coverage,
and then also partnering partnering with and understanding
other patient financing options. I think right now
we need to have,
better accessibility
to care and providing the means of affordability
at the same time.
And I think that's the the biggest challenge
is the next 2 to 3 years.
Great. Well, thank you so much for joining
us today, doctor Brennan. It's been a pleasure
speaking with you, and I look forward to
connecting with you again in the future.
Okay. Awesome. Thanks for having me.